


Tales of Winterfell and Riverrun

by DKNC



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-01
Updated: 2015-02-23
Packaged: 2018-01-06 23:57:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 54
Words: 133,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1113032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DKNC/pseuds/DKNC
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of unrelated drabbles originally posted on tumblr--some written for prompts, some as gifts for people, some canon compliant, some AU, some modern, some set in the world of Westeros--nearly all are Ned and Cat, and all feature Starks and or Tullys.</p><p>Most of these deserve a general or teen rating, but I've had to change the overall rating to mature because one or two little drabbles get a bit more "detailed."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. An Unexpected Feeling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This drabble was in response to this prompt: Wheeee!! Ned/Cat (sorry, I'm not going to be the one to break you out of your comfort zone! ;-) ), the moment Ned realized he was in love with Cat (I LOVE NED HAVING FEELINGS)

She hadn’t come to the Great Hall to break her fast, and it occurred to him that he had not seen her since the evening meal the previous night. She had looked pale and tired after three straight days and nights of tending to little Robb in his illness, and when the child’s fever finally broke late yesterday, he’d feared his attentions would be unwelcome in her exhausted state, and so had retired to his own cold bedchamber for the fourth night in a row. He was, of course, glad that his son was well for his own sake, but he was forced to admit, if only to himself, that he was equally glad at the prospect of bedding his wife again soon. Catelyn may still be formal and somewhat distant with him everywhere else in Winterfell, but in her bedchamber they had learned to find pleasure in each other, and he missed it dreadfully.

As he walked from the Great Hall, he saw a flash of red hair near the little sept which had recently been completed, and the leap his heart took at the sight of her caught him by surprise. “My lady!” he called.

She was just coming out of the sept, and she turned toward him with a smile. “Your son is well this morning, my lord,” she told him. “I left him with Septa Mordane …only for a bit. I wanted to offer a prayer of thanks to the Seven for his recovery.” Her eyes turned toward the little seven-sided building. “And I had a place to come.” Her voice quivered slightly, and those blue eyes he always felt he might drown in were shining when she looked back toward him. “I thank you for that, my lord.”

He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it gently, thinking that he’d build her anything she asked for if it would keep that smile on her lovely face. “You are most welcome, my lady,” is all he said.

She bit her lower lip then in that way which he had come to recognize meant she was thinking carefully about her words. “My lord,” she said, and her cheeks began to flush to match her hair. “I believe Robb is well enough to stay in his own room tonight if you …if you would wish …I have missed you,” she finished quickly, looking downward.

Her words filled him with joy, and he feared he could not speak. “I …would wish that very much, my lady,” he said thickly. She looked up again at that and smiled, and he felt a smile come to his own face. “Shall we go see our son?” he asked her, offering his arm.

She took it, and leaned in to him as they walked toward the Great Keep. As he reveled in the feel of her beside him, and wondered once more how he had come to wed this remarkable daughter of Riverrun, Eddard Stark, dutiful second son and reluctant Lord of Winterfell, realized with a start that he had fallen hopelessly in love with his wife.


	2. Mother's Picnics

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This drabble was written in response for the following prompt: Young Catelyn insists on certain "rituals" to make sure she and her siblings remember their mother after her passing...

"Honestly, Cat! Does it really matter?" Lysa rolled her eyes in exasperation as Catelyn meticulously spread the blanket in precisely the right spot on the river bank and began to unpack the basket, laying things out in just the right way.

"Of course, it matters," she said softly, cradling one of Mother’s little clay cups in her hand. Mother had always used the same clay dishes for their picnics—Lysa got a cup with the Tully trout painted in red, and Catelyn one in blue. She’d had to find another cup for Edmure. He’d been too little to drink from them when Mother had been here to lay out the picnics herself. He’d wanted a blue one like hers, so Catelyn had found another red one for Petyr to keep things even.

"I’m hungry," Lysa said, tossing her long braid over her shoulder. "Petyr and Edmure are, too. Food doesn’t have to look perfect before you eat it, you know."

Catelyn smiled at her younger sister. “You never gave Mother this much trouble over setting up the picnic.”

Lysa actually smiled back. “That’s because you and I were always in the river the whole time she was doing this stuff.” She looked over her shoulder where Petyr Baelish was “swordfighting” with little Edmure using twigs torn from trees, and rolled her eyes again. “The boys are too busy being “knights” to swim with me.”

Catelyn looked down to hide her amusement. For such a little girl, Lysa could work up an awful lot of indignation. In truth, she would love to swim with her sister. It was a hot day, and Catelyn was only ten years old, but no one else remembered how to set up the picnic like Mother did. If she didn’t do it, they might forget. Edmure already didn’t seem to remember much about her. She would tell him stories, but he’d confuse them all, and sometimes he seemed to confuse her with Mother.

Sighing, she put down the cup. “Come on,” she said, leading Lysa to the shore at a spot where the water was shallow and calm. Without a word, she gave her sister a shove that sent her down into the water.

"What did you do that for?" Lysa yelled.

Laughing, Catelyn called after Petyr and Edmure. “Boys! There’s a trout in the river! Come see if you can catch it!”

With a hoot, Petyr dropped his twig and dashed into the water after Lysa, and Edmure followed as quickly as his chubby little legs would carry him. Lysa squealed and splashed away from them.

Catelyn wanted very much to dive in after them herself, but they would be truly hungry after all that splashing about, and Mother would have been certain to have a perfect picnic waiting for them. She looked after her siblings and Petyr for a moment, but then turned back toward the picnic blanket.

"I’ll do my best, Mother," she whispered. "I won’t forget. I promise."


	3. Tonight, You Are Mine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Drabble written in response to this prompt: Ned/Catelyn: the night before Ned leaves to deal with Greyjoy's rebellion

She’d tried hard not to cry. She had kept herself busy all day, packing everything she thought he might need, confirming with Vayon Poole that the men were amply provisioned, even though she knew Ned had done so already. Men had been gathering at Winterfell for weeks now, and preparations were finished. Nothing remained but for them to march out tomorrow.

The men in the Great Hall had been in high spirits throughout the evening meal, drinking to war and glory and inevitable victory. Had the fools learned nothing from Robert’s Rebellion? she’d thought angrily. All war brings death, even among the victors. Ned had been somber and had very little ale himself, but a good number of his men would ride out with aching heads come morning. Finally, she’d been unable to stand it any more and had excused herself from the High Table and fled to her chambers.

Alone now, as she sat at her dressing table and brushed out her hair, she could no longer keep the tears at bay. Once they started falling, she could not stop them and laid her head down her arms on the table and wept so bitterly that she did not hear him knock.

“Cat?” his voice came hesitantly from the doorway. Then as he saw her, he came quickly to stand behind her chair. “What is amiss, my lady?” he asked.

She sat up and looked at his reflection behind her in her mirror. “I do not want you to go,” she said simply. “I fear for you.”

He knelt beside her and laid a hand on her belly which was barely rounded as of yet, the new babe still not visible beneath her skirts during the day. “I shall take very good care of myself, my lady,” he said. “I have very good reasons to return.”

She looked at his callused hand resting over their third child. “I fear you can’t feel it yet, my lord,” she said. “I have barely felt movement, myself.”

He smiled at her. “He will undoubtedly be kicking hard enough when I return.” He looked serious then. “I do hope to have this business with Balon Greyjoy settled and be home in time for this little one’s arrival.”

“Promise me,” she said suddenly, turning to face him and clutching his hand. “Promise me you will return, Ned.”

An almost anguished look passed over his face then. “I cannot promise you that, my lady. I would not lie to you. I can only promise you that I will do all in my power to return to you and our children.”

She nodded. She knew as well as he that this could be the last night he ever spent here. And for all that he’d returned from his last war with a bastard son, her husband was an honorable man. He would not comfort her with false promises.

She stood then. “Come to bed, my lord,” she said to him, putting her arms around him. He kissed her then, fiercely and possessively and she knew he desired her. I love you, she thought, although she would not say it. She’d never found the courage to say it, always fearful she would see rejection in those grey eyes. Fearful that the memory of his secret love, his bastard’s mother, would make those words unwelcome from her lips.

Now, though, as he pulled her shift over her head and hungrily kissed her neck while her hands worked to remove his clothing, she pushed the unknown shadow woman from her thoughts. He was her husband, and she pulled him to her bed and held him close, giving him all of herself and hoping to show him what she couldn’t say. Hoping that her love could somehow be strong enough to bind him to her and bring him home safely.

“Cat,” he whispered as their bodies moved together, and she cherished the sound of her name on his lips. No one was between them now. Robert Baratheon may lay claim to him tomorrow, but tonight she would share him with no one. Tonight, Eddard Stark belonged only to her, and Catelyn intended to make very certain that he knew it. 


	4. Lady of Winterfell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This drabble was written in response to this prompt: Ned/Cat - Catelyn, ruling the North during the Greyjoy Rebellion, misses Ned and worries about living up to expectations.

Catelyn Stark had a headache. She sat in her husband’s solar rubbing her temples and devoutly wishing she never had to look at another piece of parchment again. What with keeping Winterfell running smoothly and dealing with a seemingly endless stream of petitions from castles and keeps throughout the north, she had moments when she felt her husband had vastly overestimated her abilities when he left her to rule in his stead.

Ned had been gone for more than two moons now and she missed him with a longing so deep it was a physical ache. Had she any doubts that she loved her husband before he had ridden off to fight Balon Greyjoy with Robert Baratheon, she had none now, and she wondered if he missed her at all. Things were certainly different between them now than during his first war, and she knew he had some affection for her, if only for their children’s sake. Yet every time she caught sight of his bastard boy playing with Robb, she couldn’t help but wonder if he had found comfort in some other woman’s arms during this war, too. She knew well enough that men had needs, but the thought of him lying with anyone other than her pained her far more than she wished to admit, even to herself.

A knock at the door of the solar stirred her from her thoughts. “Come in,” she called, and Maester Luwin entered, carrying a rolled piece of parchment.

“Another raven,” she sighed. She’d long ago given up hoping that every raven that arrived carried news of Ned. They never did.

“A letter from Barrowton, Lady Stark,” Luwin said.

“Oh gods be good,” Catelyn said, rubbing her face with her hands. “What is the woman complaining about now?”

Maester Luwin’s mouth twitched as if he were trying not to look amused. “Well, it is a letter from Lady Dustin, my lady,” he said. “It seems that some of her smallfolk are having difficulties with a band of outlaws, and since Lord Stark took all of her fighting men …”

“Yes, yes,” Catelyn interrupted. “My lord husband apparently took every man within a hundred leagues of Barrowton between the ages of six and sixty! I’ve heard it from her before.”

“Yes, my lady,” Maester Luwin said, making no attempt to hide his amusement now. “Lady Dustin requests some assistance from Winterfell in dealing with the brigands.”

“Of course, she does. If she had her way, my entire castle guard would be in Barrowton already.” Catelyn sighed and rose heavily from the chair, rubbing her lower back which ached more fiercely almost daily as the babe within her grew.

“Ask Ser Rodrik if it is possible for him to send a small company to chase down Lady Dustin’s villains without substantially weakening the defenses at Winterfell. We’ve already sent off men to deal with the fighting among those mountain clans and I’ve no idea when they’ll return.” She frowned at that memory. Those clan chieftains would never have let their arguments escalate into actual violence had Ned been here. They hadn’t feared intervention from his little southron wife. Well, they’d been wrong about that.

“I will speak with him, my lady,” the maester replied, turning to go.

“No, wait,” she said. “Just send him here. I should probably speak with him myself—about this and other matters.”

“Yes, my lady,” he said, and turned away again.

Catelyn walked to the window and put her head against the glass as she looked down into the courtyard. “I don’t know if I can do this, Ned,” she whispered.

“You are doing admirably, my lady. Just as Lord Eddard knew you would.”

Startled, Catelyn looked up to see that the maester had not yet left the solar. “Forgive me, Maester Luwin,” she said. “I did not mean to trouble you with my complaints.”

The man smiled at her. “You should. Lord Eddard charged you with taking care of his children, his castle, and his lands, my lady, but he charged me with taking care of you.”

“Perhaps he should have given you the more important task,” she said ruefully.

His expression then as he looked at her turned thoughtful. “I believe he thinks he did, my lady. I shall go find Ser Rodrik for you.”

She stared after the man as he left, and then with a small smile of her own, she sat back down at her husband’s desk to attend to the responsibilites he had left for her.


	5. Lord of Winterfell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was written in response to this prompt: Ned/Cat: Ned is feeling insecure, comparing himself to Brandon and worrying that he falls short as a husband, father, and lord. Cat seeks to reassure him.

As usual, Ned Stark was immensely grateful to ride through the gates of Winterfell upon his return from the Dreadfort. He’d been gone for over a fortnight, and he’d missed his wife and children greatly. The joy of his return was somewhat dampened, however, by a lingering sense of unease over this particular trip. Lord Bolton had invited Lord Karstark and Lady Dustin to the Dreadfort for his visit, and he’d had the uncomfortable feeling they’d all been testing him somehow and finding him lacking. He’d been Lord of Winterfell for almost ten years now, and it irritated him that he still sometimes felt as if he were a boy trying on his brother’s armor. He’d never asked for all this.

When he saw Catelyn waiting for him in the yard with little Bran in her arms and the girls at her skirts, his heart sped up as it always did when he first saw her after an absence of any time. The two of them had long since acknowledged a depth of feeling for each other that had surprised them both, and which seemed to grow ever stronger. Yet, he could never quite forget that she, like Winterfell, was meant for Brandon. She was only his because Brandon had died, and in his current mood, even as he dismounted to walk to her, he wondered how much happier she might have been wed to his brother.

“My lord,” she greeted him at his approach, with obvious pleasure in her voice. “Welcome home.”

“It is good to be home, my lady,” he replied, running a hand over Bran’s bright baby fuzz and then kneeling down to embrace his daughters, who had each hurled themselves at him. Catelyn smiled affectionately at her daughters, patient as always, as she waited for her own embrace.

Ned was less patient. He needed her just now, and he was more brusque with the girls than was his usual manner, as he quickly freed himself from their clinging little arms to put his own around Catelyn. The kiss he pressed to her lips was more intimate than anything he normally bestowed upon her in the courtyard, and her eyes widened in surprise. “I have missed you,” he murmured softly.

She studied his face for a long moment, giving him the distinct impression she could see his very soul, as she so often seemed to do, and then she turned to a scandalized looking Septa Mordane who stood behind her, handing her Bran. “If you would take the children, please, Septa,” she said. “My lord husband and I have matters to discuss.”

The girls protested, and Ned felt vaguely guilty about disappointing them somehow, but he gave Catelyn his arm and walked her toward the Great Keep all the same. Only as they entered it, did it occur to him that his welcoming party had been incomplete. “Where are the older boys?” he asked.

Catelyn frowned, which was hardly unusual when she was forced into any conversation that included mention of Jon. “Robb and the boy thought it would be amusing set serpents loose in Septa Mordane’s rooms this morning. I have no idea how they caught and concealed so many, but there must have been at least a dozen. The septa screamed so when she saw them that Sansa and Arya were both frightened by her into sobbing.” Catelyn shook her head. “I’ve confined them both to their rooms for the day. They’ll be even sorrier for their crime when they realize they’ve missed your return.”

Ned shook his head. He wondered how she always managed to deal with any crisis the children threw her way with such calm certainty. He sometimes found himself quite at a loss about some of their more outrageous behaviors. He realized with a start that he’d led them to her bedchamber. He hadn’t consciously planned that.

When he stopped outside the door, she raised an eyebrow at him. “Well, you’ve brought me here, my lord. Are you going to take me in?” she asked with some amusement.

He opened the door for them to enter, and as soon as he had closed it behind him, he grabbed her to him and kissed her in such a manner that the septa would have been far more than scandalized had she witnessed this one, he thought. He kept Catelyn crushed against him, his emotions somewhere between desire and desperation, until she put her hand against his chest, and they broke apart, both breathing rather heavily.

“What happened at the Dreadfort?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he said. She regarded him carefully, and he knew he couldn’t leave it there. “Bolton had Arnolf Karstark and Barbrey Dustin there. They’re up to something, Cat. They want something, and I can’t quite figure out what it is. Roose Bolton is as cunning as any man I’ve ever met, and I don’t know he’s after right now.” He turned away from her and slammed a fist down on her dressing table. “I don’t know anything!”

She walked to him. “You’ll figure it out,” she said quietly.

“Will I?” he asked her. “Brandon spent his life preparing to be a lord while I played at swords and lances with Robert in the Vale. I was never meant to do this.”

“Played?” she repeated, a hint of amusement in her voice. “I have rarely seen you play at anything, my lord. And whether you were meant for this or not, you are the Lord of Winterfell, and you are very good at it, Ned.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know that, Cat. I look at these men, my bannermen, and wonder if they are imagining Brandon in my place, wishing it had been so.” Having said so much more than he intended, he lowered his eyes and quietly said one thing more. “I look at you, and wonder the same.”

Her hands were on his face then, turning it back up to look into those Tully blue eyes. “You are the Lord of Winterfell, Eddard Stark, not Brandon. And you are my huband.” She tiptoed then, and kissed him, a far more gentle kiss than their previous one, but full of feeling all the same. When she pulled her lips from his, she whispered, “I love you, Ned.”

He didn’t answer her, but he did his best to push all the doubts, guilt, and secrets that sometimes separated them out of his mind and simply accept the gift she offered. She smiled at him as he began to remove his doublet, and Ned Stark decided that everyone and everything else in Winterfell and the entire north could wait. The Lord and Lady were going to be occupied for some time.


	6. A Royal Feast at Winterfell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This little drabble was originally written as a birthday present for the lovely SomeEnchantedEve. It takes place during the feast at Winterfell when Robert and his entourage come north to see Ned after the death of Jon Arryn.

At least the Kingslayer could dance well, Catelyn thought, as he led her around the floor of the Great Hall. Dancing with Robert Baratheon had been rather unpleasant as the king was so drunk by this point that he had been able to do little more than stumble around to the music while groping at his best friend’s wife in a most inappropriate way. Ned’s expression had been nothing short of murderous by the time she escaped back to her seat beside him, and she’d placed a hand on his thigh beneath the table, quietly reminding him the man was their king, and that he’d never have behaved so were it not for the ale and the wine.

She caught sight of the king now as Jaime Lannister twirled her past one of the tables. Robert had his hand down a serving maid’s dress and his tongue halfway down her throat. Alarmed, Catelyn looked back to the High Table to see if the queen had seen him and was astonished to see Cersei Lannister looking with simmering disapproval not at her husband, but at Ser Jaime and herself.

The Kingslayer saw where she looked, and he laughed. “My sweet sister does not do well sharing attention with another beautiful woman, Lady Stark,” he said with a smile.

Catelyn, who felt about as beautiful as an old leather boot next to the golden queen, was not certain if he mocked her or not. She had watched the eyes of the men in the hall follow the movements of Cersei Lannister all evening long in her brightly colored gown with inhumanly gold hair done up in an elaborate style. Catelyn had worn her own hair in a much simpler northern style as she was the Lady of Winterfell, and felt that adopting southron dress and fashion for the evening would be an insult to their northern lords. Watching those northern lords stare after the queen, she’d realized she could likely have come into the hall naked and escaped notice.

"You are quite lovely, Lady Stark," Ser Jaime was saying. "I remember thinking so when my father sent me to Riverrun because he was considering a match for me with your sister. Had it been with you, I’d have likely shown more interest, but alas, you were already promised to Brandon Stark of Winterfell."

"I …thank you, Ser Jaime," she said with dignified courtesy, still not entirely sure he wasn’t having a jape at her expense.

"And here you are, after more than a decade in this frozen wasteland the Starks call home, still looking like a girl from Riverrun in spite of popping out an alarming number of little Starks. How many is it again?"

"Five," she said, frowning slightly. The man had tightened his arm around her waist, and she twisted to look toward the High Table. Ned was watching them now, as well as Cersei Lannister, and neither of them looked happy. For some reason, that fact seemed to amuse her dance partner greatly.

"Why doesn’t your frozen faced lord dance with you?" Lannister asked her now. "Does he not mind seeing you in the arms of every other man in the hall? From what I recall of your original betrothed, he would not have been so unconcerned."

That made Catelyn angry. “My lord husband does not care to dance, and as he knows I enjoy it, he does not object to respectable men partnering me,” she said sharply, pulling Jaime Lannister’s arm from her waist to increase the distance between them. “As to whose arms I prefer to spend my time in, my husband need not concern himself over it, for he knows my desires in that quite well.”

The Kingslayer laughed at that. “Well, my lady, perhaps Lord Eddard isn’t always quite as cold as he appears. You do have those five children, after all.”

Catelyn tried in vain to keep the color from rising to her cheeks, but then the song mercifully ended, and Jaime Lannister escorted her back to Ned. “My lord,” he said in a voice easily audible to his twin sister, “You have a most beautiful and charming wife.” Cersei Lannister glowered at him.

Ned’s eyes were the color of storm clouds. “I am very well aware of that, Ser Jaime,” he said rather coldly. Standing up, he took Catelyn’s hand. “Dance with me, my lady.”

It was a command rather than a request, and Catelyn raised her eyebrows but followed him to a rather quiet corner of the hall, where he put his arms around her and began to move her to the music. When he pulled her closer than necessary, she did not object.

"What did he say to you?" he growled in her ear.

"Nothing, really," she said. "He’s a man fond of making japes, and he was going on about his sister not liking to share space with beautiful women." She rolled her eyes. "As if any man in the hall has looked away from her all night."

Ned chuckled then. “He’s right, you know. You should have seen her watching you dance. And look at her now. I’d wager her brother is hearing about his compliments of you.”

Catelyn turned in the direction of Ned’s gaze to see the Lannister twins standing very close together, and Cersei was indeed speaking angrily about something while her brother wore the same amused expression he’d had while dancing with her. She looked around further and noticed that both Robert and the serving maid were gone from the hall.

"More likely she’s berating him to do something about her husband’s disgraceful behavior," she said. "That’s what I would be concerned with were I she."

Ned’s mouth twitched then, and she saw distinct amusement in his grey eyes. “How fortunate for me then, that I look only at you tonight, my lady.”

"Stop it, Ned," she said, irritated with him. It was one thing to be mocked by Jaime Lannister, but she wouldn’t accept it from her husband.

"Cat, look at me," he told her, lifting her chin so that his eyes captured hers. "You are the most beautiful woman here tonight or any night. Cersei Lannister may draw the eye like some gaudy ornament displayed to impress, but I don’t need to look at her. You know I have no love of gaudy things. I do, however, appreciate true beauty."

The look of raw desire in her husband’s eyes made Catelyn’s insides flutter. She swallowed as she looked at him, and realized that they had stopped any pretense of dancing and merely stood there in the corner with their arms around each other. “How long until we can courteously bid our guests good night, my lord?” she asked. They had long since sent all the children to their rooms.

"Now, my lady," he told her. Lowering his head to hers, he nuzzled her ear as he growled into it, "I have had quite my fill of Baratheons and Lannisters for one evening. I now intend to devote all of my attention to my wife."

Catelyn felt inexpressibly beautiful then as she allowed her husband to lead her from the hall.


	7. When Mom and Dad Get the House to Themselves . . .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I went Modern AU to write a response to this prompt: Ned/Cat - they break the bed while having sex... again

“I can’t get out of here yet because Anna’s mother is late again. The woman always has an excuse, but I swear, Ned, this is getting old.” Ned Stark could hear the exasperation in his wife’s voice through the phone. “Can you get them fed?” she continued, “and remind Robb his practice has been moved to 8am tomorrow so he shouldn’t stay out too terribly late if he is still going over to Jon’s after the movie, and make sure the girls don’t forget their …”

“Cat,” he interrupted her. “I’ve got it covered. The kids are all taken care of. Just get here when you can.”

He heard her sigh. “I love you,” she said. Then he laughed, and they said their goodbyes.

He had the kids taken care of, all right, and he hoped Catelyn would not be too long delayed. While he had a long established practice of leaving his office early on Fridays, it seemed she never failed to get stuck late at the daycare she ran for special needs children because some parent or another was tardy to pick up their child. He was immensely proud of his wife’s accomplishments with her business, but sometimes he wished she had a job she could get away from more easily.

He poured himself a glass of wine while he waited for her. He’d already taken the girls to Robert’s for Myrcella Baratheon’s sleepover, and Benjen had agreed to take Bran and Rickon to the ballgame and let them stay over at his house. As for Robb, well he could just be tired for practice because Ned had told him he could stay at his cousin’s until midnight. Tonight, he was not sharing his wife with their children.

He smiled, thinking about spending the entire evening in bed with Cat, unconcerned about little ears or inopportune knocks at their bedroom door. He loved his children dearly, but their presence did tend to inhibit his wife’s responses in bed. Over the past decade, he supposed he’d heard, “Be careful, Ned, they’ll hear us,” about fifty times for every once he heard her cry out his name in ecstasy.

That was Robb’s fault. The boy had been all of five years old when he’d come rushing into their bedroom yelling, “Mommy, are you okay?” after Cat had cried out particularly loudly one night. The two of them had jumped apart, both grabbing for the covers at the foot of the bed, and had landed back down with so much force, the wooden frame of the antique bed had cracked beneath them. That event had ushered in years of largely silent lovemaking as their little family continued to grow.

Not tonight, he thought. Tonight, he intended to get her to make every one of her little sounds that drove him crazy. He carried the bottle of wine along with his glass and one other into their bedroom, and he had to laugh as he looked at the overly ornate antique bed that they still had to this day. It had belonged to Catelyn’s mother, Minisa, who had died when she was just girl, and her father had given it to them as a wedding gift. Ned had repaired it eleven years ago by hammering two-by-fours beneath the cracked wooden supports because Cat had absolutely refused to consider buying a new one. His ordinarily practical wife got highly sentimental where her family was concerned, and since old Hoster Tully had died the previous year, Ned imagined she’d likely never part with the ancient bed now.

“Hello?” he heard Cat’s voice call from the entryway, and he went to meet her.

She was pulling off her jacket as he entered the front room. “Where is everyone?” she asked him.

“Gone,” he said, taking her jacket from her to hang up in the closet. “Sansa and Arya are at Myrcella’s with everything they need for the night. Benjen took the little boys for a ballgame and boys’ night, and Robb is no doubt attempting to put his arm around that little Westerling girl he’s got at the theater.”

“Ned!” she said, “You shouldn’t talk about our son like that!” But she was laughing.

“Well,” he said, pulling her into his arms and reaching for the clasp that held her hair up behind her head, “Robb may or may not put the moves on his girl, but I definitely have plans for mine.”

“Oh, I see,” she said, her blue eyes sparkling. His fingers had managed to open the clasp, and she shook her head then, causing the thick auburn waves to fall freely down around her shoulders. She took his breath away.

“God, you’re beautiful,” he said, before kissing her in a fashion that no doubt would have had Robb staring, Sansa blushing, and the younger three making gagging sounds. But no children were present, so he went right on kissing her and undoing the buttons on her blouse while he was at it. She made no protest, but started working at the buttons on his shirt as well.

He became rather vaguely aware as they kissed and undressed each other that they were moving in the direction of the bedroom, and he realized to his great joy that she was as desperate for this as he was. By the time he sat naked on the bed, pulling her down to him, they were both more than ready. She straddled him, taking him inside her and crying out his name as she moved over him feverishly. When she shuddered uncontrollably as she reached her peak, he thought his heart might explode. He flipped her onto her back then, and drove into her seeking his own release. He thought he heard a cracking sound, but it couldn’t quite penetrate the intense cloud of sensation surrounding him as he lost himself in his wife.

Afterward, as he lay there utterly spent and satisfied, he could feel her shaking beneath him and realized she was laughing. “What?” he said.

“I think we broke the bed,” she said, laughing harder.

“What?” he repeated, pushing himself off her. As he rose to a seated position, he realized the bed now tilted at a sharp angle. “Oh, god!” he said. “Not again!”

She laughed harder now, barely able to get out the words, “At least we got to finish this time!”

He looked at his beautiful wife and started to laugh with her. “Thank God!” he said. Then he sighed, and rose from the bed after kissing her once more.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“To get my toolbox,” he said. “I think there’s some scrap lumber in the basement. I only have until midnight to fix this bed.”

She looked at him quizzically.

“Robb is no longer five years old, my love, and I am NOT explaining this to him when he gets home.”

The sound of her laughter followed him from the room, and he smiled.


	8. Mending What's Broken

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This slightly longer drabble was originally written as a gift for joely_jo. It is canon compliant, taking place at Winterfell prior to the events of A Game of Thrones.

“Apologize to Lady Catelyn, Jon.”

Her husband’s voice was as frozen as his face, displaying no emotion. Catelyn looked down from his grey eyes into the alarmingly similar grey eyes of the little boy who stood in front of him. The child’s face was almost as expressionless as Ned’s, but his voice wavered when he said quietly, “I am sorry I broke the candlestick, Lady Stark. I shouldn’t have been playing in here.”

She pressed her lips tightly together before responding, “No, you shouldn’t have. I thank you for the apology. Now see that you do not come into my chambers without permission again.”

The boy nodded and then nearly fled from the room, forgetting to take leave of Ned or herself. Her husband started to call after him, but Catelyn stopped him. “Let him go, Ned.”

Ned looked at her a moment and then stooped to the floor to pick up the three pieces of the marble candlestick and the candle which it had held. “I do not believe it can be mended,” he said, examining the jagged pieces. “I shall get you another, my lady. Mayhaps, I can find one like this in White Harbor.”

“There is no need. We have candlesticks aplenty in Winterfell.”

“But you were fond of this one, I know.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she insisted. “I don’t need you to buy me another one.”

“Catelyn,” he said slowly. “I could hear you berating the boy for breaking it from the other end of the corridor. Don’t tell me it doesn’t matter.”

“It isn’t the candlestick!” she snapped. “I walked in to find him in my room. Going through my things! I don’t want him here, Ned. He must live at Winterfell. You have made that abundantly clear, my lord, but this is my room. Can I not have even this one place for myself?”

He looked down then, not meeting her eyes as he said, “Robb and the girls run in and out of your chambers freely, my lady. Jon only wants to …”

“He is not my son,” she said coldly. “Do not ask me to treat him as one of my children. I will not, my lord.”

He raised his eyes to hers once more, and she saw the grief in them now. Her heart hurt to see it, but she held on to her anger. She could not soften toward him on this. She simply could not.

“No,” he said softly. “I will not ask it of you. I will see to it that he does not come in here again.”

Without another word to her, he turned and left her chambers, and Catelyn allowed the tears she’d held back to fill her eyes then. Likely, he had gone to make certain the boy was all right, she thought bitterly. Had Robb broken something of hers, Ned would have taken the strap to him.

He was always harder on Robb. The one time she had called him on it, he had spoken of Robb’s future responsibilities as the Lord of Winterfell and the need for him to hold himself to a higher standard of conduct than other men. _At eight years of age!_ she thought derisively. She always thought Ned’s reluctance to punish Jon Snow came from guilt over his own sin—or worse, from a desire to protect the child of a woman he had loved and lost, but could not forget.

She shook her head, attempting to clear it of such thoughts. She was Ned’s wife, the Lady of Winterfell, and she knew he cared for her. He had always treated her with respect, and as the years had passed, she believed he had developed true affection for her. He had given her four beautiful children and certainly enjoyed coming to her bed. In fact, he rarely slept elsewhere. _He’ll_ _likely retire to his own chamber tonight,_ she thought bitterly. The bastard boy he’d brought home from Robert’s Rebellion was really the only thing that ever caused true discord between them anymore.

After a bit, a young boy’s high pitched squeal of delight interrupted her unhappy thoughts, and she walked to her window. The sight of eight year old Robb, brandishing a wooden sword over her husband who had fallen to the ground with some sort of mock injury made her smile. Yet, a moment later she caught sight of the other eight year old running toward Ned, also waving a wooden sword, and her smile died as she watched this man she had come to love so deeply grab both of them and pull them down on top of him, a grin transforming his solemn face. He rolled over, pinning both boys to the ground. He then proceeded to tickle them, his deep laugh mingling with their childish giggles. He loved to laugh with his sons. His sons. But only one of the two was hers.

The tears in her eyes began to fall more freely then, and she actually sank to the floor and began crying in earnest, something Catelyn Stark rarely allowed herself to do. She cried quietly, not wishing to wake little Bran who slept in the cradle on the other side of her bed. It was a miracle he hadn’t awakened when she had shouted at Ned’s bastard, startling the child into dropping the candlestick. She hadn’t meant to shout, but she had been so shocked to see him there, standing at her dressing table and touching all her things. _He does not belong here!_ The angry tears continued to flow as she sat in the floor by her window.

“Mother?”

Catelyn looked up to see her five year old daughter eyeing her with concern.

“Sansa sweetling, where is your sister?” she asked, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her dress.

“She ran away when we saw you crying. Why are you crying, Mother? Did you fall down on your knee?”

That made her laugh. Sansa had fallen and scraped her knee through the material of her dress just yesterday, and the poor girl had howled for a good half hour. “No, sweetling. My knees are both unhurt. But we really should find your sister.” At barely three, Arya was prone to wander the entire castle without fear which caused Catelyn to fear for her greatly.

“But you’re sad,” Sansa protested. “Do you want me to sing you a song? That’s what you do when I’m sad.”

Catelyn pulled her daughter into a tight hug. “I’m not sad, Sansa. Not now.” She ran her hands through her daughter’s bright hair, shining like copper in the evening sunlight coming through the window. “But we truly must find Arya now. She’s too little to wander the corridors of the Great Keep alone.”

Before Catelyn could untangle herself from Sansa in order to stand up, though, she heard another small voice. “Mother? I got you tumthing.”

Catelyn smiled at her younger daughter, standing in the doorway with her little fist tightly closed around something. Her braid was half undone, and there was some sort of reddish stain on the front of her dress. Catelyn took comfort in the fact that the little girl’s face was free of tears, so it likely wasn’t blood.

“What do you have there?” she asked, holding out her hand.

Arya ran forward and dropped a smooth black pebble into her mother’s open palm. “Wock!” she exclaimed. “A pwetty wock!”

“Oh, it’s lovely!” she exclaimed, pulling Arya into her arms. She wondered if the child would ever master her ‘s’ or ‘r’ sounds and almost hoped that she wouldn’t do so too quickly.

“Don’t be tad,” Arya said gravely, looking up at her with Ned’s eyes.

“Oh, I’m not, sweetling. I promise I’m not!” She pulled both girls tightly against her, thanking the gods for the gift of her children.

“Then why are you crying again?” asked Sansa.

“I’m not,” she laughed, even as her eyes watered now from an emotion that was far from grief. Before she could say anything else, a loud wail emanated from the other side of the bed.

“Well, Baby Bwan is!” yelled Arya, sticking her fingers in her ears. “Make him top!”

Laughing, Catelyn pushed both girls up off her, and went to retrieve her hungry one year old son.

Much later, after all the children had been tucked into their beds, Catelyn sat in her chambers brushing out her hair. The evening meal in the Great Hall had passed pleasantly enough. The children had all behaved reasonably well, although Robb had gotten rather carried away describing the great battle he and Jon Snow had fought against a dragon ( played by Ned) and knocked his plate off the table. He had been thoroughly embarrassed when everyone laughed, but seemed quite relieved that neither of his parents had gotten angry at him. He and Ned’s bastard, who’d been almost entirely silent through the meal, had asked to be excused soon after that, and Ned had accompanied Catelyn to the girls’ room to tell them good night before going to his solar.

She and Ned hadn’t spoken much at dinner, but the silence had not been terribly uncomfortable. She hoped that by tomorrow they could put today’s tension behind them. Just as she began to braid her hair for bed, a soft knock came at her door, and her heart leapt up into her throat. “Come in,” she called without getting up from her chair.

Her back was to the door, but she saw him open it and enter in her mirror. “I hope I do not disturb you, my lady,” he said softly.

“You do not, my lord,” she replied, continuing to work on her hair.

He came to stand behind her and met her eyes in the mirror. “You are quite beautiful, Cat,” he told her, and she felt the heat rise in her cheeks.

He removed her hands from her hair and then used his own to undo the braid she had started. “Catelyn …may I stay with you tonight, my lady?” he asked hesitantly.

She stood up then and turned to face him. “Yes, my love,” she said, putting a hand on his bearded cheek. “I am your wife.”

He kissed her then, and she pressed herself against him, marveling as she always did at how well their bodies fit together.

“You are my wife, Cat,” he said in voice thick with emotion when he finally broke the kiss. “And I am most glad of it, my lady.”

As she let her husband lead her to her bed, Catelyn Stark knew that he would never apologize. He had made the boy apologize for her broken candlestick, but he would never apologize for putting the boy in her home. She told herself she didn’t need the apology. Yet, she did need something.

“Are you truly glad of it, my lord?” she asked as he laid her down, trying to keep her voice light.

He sat beside her, leaning down to look directly in her eyes as his hands traced her face before moving down her neck and to her breasts. “I have never been gladder of anything, my lady,” he assured her.

She could see the honesty in those eyes of his. She closed her own eyes then and gave herself up to the pleasure of his touch. _Ned does care for me as his wife,_ she thought as she reached behind his neck to pull his face down to hers. _I have Ned and our children, and it is more than enough. It must be._

Neither of them ever spoke about the broken candlestick again, and Catelyn never again caught Jon Snow sneaking into her chambers. Yet when Ned returned from a visit to White Harbor some six moons later, a brand new marble candlestick appeared on her dressing table that evening, and Catelyn smiled a little to see it. She would never be completely at peace with Jon Snow’s presence in their lives, and her husband would likely never say all she wanted to hear, but she had to believe he did love her. Why else would he do such things?

“Cat?” he asked softly from where he lay on her bed.

She gazed at the new candlestick a moment longer before turning to look at him. It wasn’t exactly the same as the old one, the one she had brought with her from Riverrun. How could it be? Yet, he would not leave her with only jagged pieces. He never did. She looked at him now in the candlelight, waiting for her with his eyes full of …desire, yes …but something more as well. _I love you, Ned,_ she thought. _Gods, how I love you._

Immediately, she wondered if she had spoken the words aloud, for his face lit up with one of those rare smiles that could stop her heart. Then Catelyn caught her breath, for in his grey eyes she could see his silent response to her unspoken declaration as clearly as if it were written out in ink, and it was everything she had ever wanted.

With her heart soaring somewhere above her, she turned back to the table just long enough to blow out the candle before going to her husband. As Ned pulled her down to him in the dark, Catelyn nearly cried for the simple joy of finding nothing jagged or broken between them.


	9. A Throne Unexpected

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This little AU drabble was written in response to this prompt: Woohoo! Cat/Ned - king and queen AU (BECAUSE MAH FIERCE TULLY KWEEN)

Catelyn stood by the open window desperately longing for a breeze. The air in the Red Keep was stifling, and the front of her gown was damp with sweat where Robb had lain against it, fretful and whining for what seemed like hours before she finally got him to settle in his cradle. No breeze was to be had, though, and she sighed deeply, missing the fragrant breezes and cool waters of Riverrun. She was not made for this place. She almost laughed at the absurdity of her situation. She had half dreaded traveling north to take her place as the Lady of Winterfell, fearing she would freeze in a land that could have snow even in summer. Instead she’d come further south to roast in this city of more people than she’d ever seen massed together in one place before.

She turned away from the window with her desire for cool air unsatisfied and surveyed the three gowns which had been laid out for her to make her choice for tonight’s dinner. It seemed every dinner here was a political affair, and tonight was no different. Lord Mace Tyrell and Lord Paxter Redwyne had come to present themselves and swear fealty to the king.

The king. Her husband. She looked at the beautifully crafted gold crown that lay on her dressing table. Her crown. She still did not believe it, in spite of her coronation having taken place almost a fortnight ago. It wasn’t supposed to have happened like this. Robert Baratheon was to be the king. Eddard Stark would then be free to return to Winterfell, bringing Catelyn and their son to the place she’d imagined as her future home for years now. But Robert had fallen at the Trident. Eddard, _Ned, he_ _prefers to be called Ned,_ had killed Rhaegar and then ridden to King’s Landing to find Aerys dead and the city sacked by Lannister men. Even more terrible, he’d been presented with the bodies of Rhaegar’s murdered wife and children.

With no clear claimant to the throne, Jon Arryn had suggested Eddard, _Ned,_ take the crown in an effort to prevent further bloodshed. Catelyn knew her husband had protested, but there truly was no one else among the victors who could be king. And Eddard Stark was nothing if not dutiful. He’d been hastily crowned, immediately sent men to relieve the siege at Storm’s End, and then he set about stabilizing the capital. When he felt secure enough, he’d sent for her, and on her arrival, she too, had been crowned—Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Her father had been exceedingly pleased, her sister beside herself with envy, and Catelyn herself merely stunned and oddly disappointed that the snowy northern castle she’d been thinking about for so long would never be her home.

As she stood there regarding the dresses, she heard a soft knock at her door and turned around to see it open slowly, revealing her husband the king. Beside him, as always, stood Ser Barristan Selmy of the Kingsguard.

“Might I come in, Catelyn?” her husband asked in that quiet, deep, always formal sounding voice of his.

“Of course, Your Grace,” she replied.

He indicated to Ser Barristan that he should wait outside and he came in, closing the door behind him. “Is he asleep?” he asked, looking toward the cradle with a hint of disappointment.

“Yes, Your Grace. He just went down. I’m afraid he isn’t used to the climate here. The air wasn’t as … heavy … in Riverrun.”

“He’s a Stark,” her husband said simply. “We aren’t made for this weather, I fear.”

She looked at him and noted how very tired he appeared. His long face looked older by more than just the one year since their wedding, and sadder and lonelier than she’d ever imagined it could. He’d always looked grave, but the crown had given him no joy. She knew that well enough, and felt guilty about her own discontentedness, for his part was far more difficult. “You and Robb will both survive it, though, Your Grace. Direwolves are stronger than most.”

He actually tried to smile at her then. “Please, Catelyn,” he said. “I am thoroughly tired of being called Your Grace today. I would have my wife, at least, call me by my name. Otherwise, I fear I shall forget what it is.”

“Very well, Eddard …Ned,” she said. “Come sit down. You look tired.”

“I am tired,” he told her, sinking into a chair. “I am thoroughly tired of Tywin Lannister.”

“You met with him again today?”

“He has agreed to turn over Clegane.”

Catelyn’s eyes widened. Prince Doran Martell had been demanding the head of Princess Elia’s murderer since well before she’d arrived in King’s Landing, but Lannister had refused to give the man up. He, in turn, had been steadfastly demanding the release of his son, Jaime, whom Ned had imprisoned for the murder of King Aerys. Not that her husband wouldn’t have willingly slain Aerys in battle, but Jaime Lannister was a member of the Kingsguard, sworn to protect the king, not kill him in cold blood.

She realized suddenly that his hands were shaking, and she came and knelt before him, taking his hands in her own. “Your Grace …Ned? What is it? What troubles you?” She knew her husband was not made of ice. She had seen the warmth in his eyes when he gazed at Robb and felt the warmth in his touch when he came to her bed, but she had never seen him look so openly distressed over anything.

“I am pardoning the Kingslayer,” he said, and she thought he almost choked on the words. He looked her in the eyes. “Jon Arryn says I have no choice. The crown is deeply in debt, and we need the gold of Casterly Rock. We also need Dorne, and we will not have them while Gregor Clegane lives. So I give Tywin his golden son, and he gives me gold and Clegane.” His hands tightened around hers, and his eyes seemed to search hers, looking for understanding or perhaps even absolution.

“I think Lord Arryn is right. Ser Jaime acted wrongly, but Aerys was mad and cruel. Princess Elia and her babe were innocent. I would see her murderer brought to justice,” she said softly. “You will send both Lannisters away from King’s Landing?”

He nodded. “They can go back to their Rock and die there for all I care,” he said bitterly. “And I pray I do not live to regret this decision.”

“What of the Lady Cersei?” she asked, annoyed that she couldn’t keep the tremor from her voice. Tywin Lannister had brought his beautiful, golden haired daughter to King’s Landing and Catelyn was well aware why had done so. She looked down at her hands holding her husband’s as she awaited his answer.

“She will leave as well,” he said firmly. “Catelyn look at me.” She raised her eyes to meet his and was surprised to see some strong emotion in their grey depths. “You are my wife. My queen. I will have no other. Whatever you have heard whispered in corridors, I would have you know that.”

She felt tears sting her eyes then. She had known him for a man of honor. She had not truly believed he would set her aside for political gain. Yet, to hear him speak so touched her more deeply than she had thought it would. “I will do my best to be worthy of the honor, Your Grace,” she whispered.

“You already are,” he said gently. “And my name is Ned.”

“Ned,” she repeated, and she was rewarded with a further softening of his features into what was almost a smile. Emboldened by that, she added. “Do you remember what I told you to call me at Riverrun?”

“Cat,” he said softly, and he let go of one of her hands to reach out and run his fingers through her hair.

Without thinking about it she raised her hand to stroke his bearded cheek, and suddenly he was pulling her into his arms. For all that they had been married more than a year and were now king and queen of the Seven Kingdoms, they had spent less than a moon’s turn in each other’s company. They were little more than strangers, and yet being in his arms, being kissed by him, suddenly felt like the most natural thing in the world. _I want to help him,_ she thought, as his lips and tongue explored her own. _I want to be his wife and his queen._ The realization that she felt something more than duty toward this solemn northman took her by surprise. She wondered if his refusal to set her aside came from something more than duty as well, and found herself hoping that it did.

“Cat,” he murmured against her neck as he stood up, pulling her with him. She felt herself grow warm with desire rather than from the humid air and didn’t protest as he moved her toward the bed.

A sudden loud knocking on the door and a shouted, “Your Grace!” woke Robb and caused the two of them to jump apart. Catelyn went to retrieve the crying infant, and Ned went to the door. When he opened it, the soldier who’d knocked and shouted stood aside to reveal Jon Arryn standing there grim faced.

As she stood there, bouncing her son gently back to sleep, Catelyn watched her husband’s face which had been so warm with desire for her a moment before freeze hard as he looked at his Hand’s expression.

“Come in, Jon,” he said in that cold, formal voice, “And tell me whatever it is.”

The old man shut the door behind him, nodded courteously to Catelyn and turned to face Ned. He seemed to have trouble speaking. “There’s been a raven from Howland Reed,” he said finally.

Ned stiffened. Catelyn knew Lord Reed was one of the men whom Ned had sent after Lyanna Stark when he’d received word of her whereabouts. She also knew that Ned had argued bitterly with Jon Arryn about going himself. He couldn’t, of course. He’d just been crowned king of a broken kingdom. He couldn’t go riding off to retrieve his sister, regardless of his own desires. She’d heard these things from others after her arrival, as her husband would not discuss Lyanna with her at all. It seemed no one in the Red Keep discussed Lyanna Stark openly, only in whispers, and never around Ned.

“What did it say, Jon?” Ned asked finally, and Catelyn felt afraid at the fear she could hear in her husband’s voice. She thought of how his hands had gripped hers so tightly a moment ago, and laying Robb gently back in his cradle, she went to stand beside him, taking his hand once more in his. She feared what grief and trouble Jon Arryn’s next words would bring them, but Ned had told her she was his his wife and his queen. Whatever he faced, she would stand beside him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a part 2 of this story which is found in chapter 21 of these "Tales."


	10. When Winter Seemed Far Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This canon compliant pre-Game of Thrones ficlet was written in response to this prompt: Ned and Catelyn discussing the future during one of her pregnancies.
> 
> It's actually a happy little story, but when I think of what happens in the books, it makes me rather sad.

She finally found him in the stables looking at a new foal. She’d already looked in his solar, in the godswood, in the Great Hall, and in the practice yard. It was in the practice yard, that Ned’s bastard, overhearing her question to Ser Rodrik, had come away long enough from where he and Robb were watching men spar to quietly mumble that Lord Eddard had gone to the stables.

Today, Catelyn refused to be irritated that the bastard knew better where his father was than Robb did. She even thanked the boy for the information, feeling vaguely guilty at the shocked look on his long Stark face when she did.

 _This child may be a son,_ she thought. _A son who looks as much like Ned as the daughter I gave him last._ The prospect made her smile, and she quickened her step toward the stables.

She’d thought she was with child even before Ned left for his quick visit to the Cerwyns, but she didn’t want to say anything to him until she was certain. He’d been gone four days during which she’d become surer each passing day. Her moonblood was only a week late, but she’d borne three babes now and knew well enough how it felt. The soreness of her breasts, the queasiness of her belly in the morning, the alarming capacity of certain scents to strike her so forcefully all of a sudden—-she remembered these things well and knew she carried a fourth Stark babe within her. _Ned will be so pleased._

He was running a hand over the spindly legs of the little black foal when she entered the stables. Hullen stood beside him, looking as proud as if he’d birthed the foal himself.

“He’s a good, sturdy little one, Lord Eddard,” the man was saying. “You mean to give this one to young Robb?”

“I do,” Ned said, standing back up straight. “The boy’s six. He should have his own horse. A horse, not a pony, and I’d like him to have a hand in training it from the start.” He smiled at Hullen. “With your supervision, of course.”

“My pleasure, my lord. The young lord’s a good lad. He’ll do well. Have you told him yet?”

Ned laughed at that. “If I’d told him, he’d be here already. I asked Jon to keep him away. I’d like to talk to his mother first so we can tell him about the foal together.”

Catelyn’s heart leapt when she heard Ned speak of his desire to include her in Robb’s surprise, and she realized this also explained why Jon Snow had known his location when Robb obviously didn’t. “My lord,” she said, revealing her presence in the stable, and both men turned to look at her.

“My lady!” Ned exclaimed, grinning widely. “Have you managed to get our youngest pup to sleep then?”

He had only been back at Winterfell for a few hours. She’d met him in the courtyard with the children, but one year old Arya had been well overdue for her nap and was behaving rather badly. She’d scarcely had a chance to say hello to her husband and no time with him privately before she was forced to go to the girls’ room and spend entirely too long coaxing the overtired child to actually sleep.

“She sleeps, my lord. Thank the old gods and the new.”

Ned came to her then and put his hands on her waist even with Hullen there. Catelyn wished Hullen were not there so that he might touch her even more freely. “You look beautiful, my lady. I have missed you.”

“I have missed you as well,” she said.

The two of them simply looked at each other for a long moment until Hullen cleared his throat. “Would you like to see your son’s new horse, my lady?”

She stepped away from Ned, immediately missing the feel of his hands on her, and walked toward the little horse. “He is beautiful,” she said. “Are you quite certain Robb is old enough to care for him, and then to break and train him?” she asked.

The Master of Horse laughed. “Well, it isn’t like I’ll leave him to his own devices, my lady. I’ll take care of your boy and this little fellow. You have my word on that.”

Catelyn smiled at him, and Ned said, “You’re a good man, Hullen. If you will excuse us, I shall escort Lady Catelyn to the Great Keep.”

Once they were outside the stables, she leaned into him as they walked along arm in arm. “I wasn’t aware I was going to the Great Keep, my love,” she teased.

“You are very tired, my lady. I believe you could use a rest.”

“A rest? Is that what you call it?” she laughed.

“Gods, I’ve missed you,” he said, stopping suddenly and pulling her against him right out in the middle of the courtyard.

“Well, I have missed you, too, as I said, but I think perhaps we should go on to my chambers, my lord.” Her words were stern, but she knew he could see the laughter and the desire in her eyes.

He laughed and she reveled in the sound of it. “As you wish, my lady.” He offered her his arm once more, and they began walking again. “What brought you out to the stables, Cat?”

“You. I sought you out because I have some news.”

“Did a raven arrive while I was gone? Some good news, I hope.”

“No raven,” she said. “But it is good news.”

They had reached the Keep and as he opened the door for her, he said, “Whatever it is, it can wait until we reach your chambers.”

She laughed again, and felt suddenly younger and more alive than she had in awhile. Summer had finally arrived in the north, her husband was home, and a new child grew within her. She feared nothing and looked forward to everything. When they entered her chambers and closed the door behind them, she wasn’t surprised when Ned wrapped his arms around her and pressed his mouth to hers hungrily.

“Mmm,” she said breathlessly when they finally broke apart. “You have missed me.”

“More than you know,” he said, lifting her up and carrying her to the bed.

Neither of them cared that everyone in the castle who knew where they’d gone likely knew what they were doing. There was no more conversation and very little coherent thought for quite awhile as the Lord and Lady of Winterfell reacquainted themselves with each other. Catelyn had learned well how to wait for those she loved over the course of her life, but she could not recall an absence of four days ever seeming so long before.

Afterward, as they lay tangled up together slowly recovering breath and rational thought, she recalled how she once had believed she would never know a feeling like this. To love and be loved so in return had seemed completely out of her reach in those first days and weeks at Winterfell. Now, while she still had her occasional moments of insecurity and a certain amount of lingering resentment in the matter of the bastard being raised alongside Robb, she generally did not allow those things to cloud her days. Ned loved her. She knew it as certainly as she knew the sun would rise each morning. And the gods knew she loved him.

“Didn’t you say you had some news, Cat?” he asked lazily, twirling a strand of her hair around his finger.

“Oh, I do,” she said, smiling. She reached up and removed his hand from her hair and laid it gently on her belly. “You are going to be father again, Lord Stark.”

“I …you …so soon?” he asked her, startled. “Arya’s only a year old! She’s not even weaned yet!”

Catelyn laughed. “You forget, my love. Sansa wasn’t much older when we made Arya. Perhaps we shall have another son, Ned.”

He kissed her softly. “A son would be a fine thing. So would another daughter.” He looked at her seriously. “Are you well, Cat? Is this …all right?”

She laughed again. “You truly have forgotten, Ned. Will I have to teach you all over how I am not fragile and will not break simply because I am with child?”

He caressed her face and looked into her eyes. “I know you are anything but fragile, my love. But you are precious to me, and I would keep you safe and well always.”

She was unable to speak for a moment, so she only looked back at him, hoping he could see what she felt in her eyes. Finally she whispered, “I am always safe with you.”

“So, do you truly think this one is a boy?” he asked her then, pulling her close and resting her head on his chest.

“I honestly don’t know, but I would like another boy. We have only the one son and two daughters.” She never counted the bastard even though she knew he did. “It would be nice to even the numbers. Otherwise, poor Robb will be outnumbered, and the girls will drive him to distraction once they are older. Being a girl myself, I know how annoying girls can be when they choose.”

Ned laughed. “So do I. I had a younger sister, remember?”

Catelyn smiled. It was so rare that Ned could speak of his lost siblings without sorrow. “Well, to be fair, younger brothers can be rather a trial as well. If this little pup is anything like Edmure was as a child, Sansa and Arya will be ready to murder him on occasion.”

Ned laughed again. “They’ll all get along just fine. Wolves are pack animals, you know.”

“If I don’t know, then I must be deaf. You’ve said it often enough,” she teased. “But even wolves squabble within their pack, and our children will be no different. You can already see how different Sansa and Arya are from each other and I don’t mean their appearance. Their temperaments are night and day. No doubt they’ll have some terrible arguments.”

“But they will be close. They are sisters,” Ned insisted.

“Of course, my love. But they might not always know it.” She smiled. “You know I love my sister, Lysa, but when we were girls I sometimes wanted to strangle her. And if this new little pup is a boy, just imagine how he’ll tag after Robb. There will be times Robb will most definitely want him to go away.”

“I cannot wait to see Robb with that new horse,” Ned said then. “I thought we could take him to the stable before the evening meal.”

“I’d like that,” Catelyn replied, “Although it seems impossible to believe he’s already old enough. Six years! Where did they go?”

“Time goes quickly, my love. Before you know it, this one will be six years old,” he said, laying his hand once more on her belly. “And at the rate we’re going we’ll have two or three more by then.”

She laughed.

“And then our sons will be bringing home wives, and men will come courting our daughters, and we’ll have a castle full of grandchildren to contend with,” he continued.

She smacked him playfully. “I am six and twenty! Don’t speak to me of grandchildren!”

“Would you prefer we not speak at all, my lady? Because I would be fine with that.” He grinned wickedly and began kissing her neck.

In truth, his words had bothered her a bit because time did seem to move quickly, and she wanted to hold on to her happiness. She didn’t want to think about her girls grown and gone off to be wives and mothers in faraway places. While Robb would always be in Winterfell, any other sons she had would leave her one day as well.

 _That’s a long way off,_ she told herself firmly as she began to feel warmer and warmer under Ned’s kisses. Maester Luwin had told her this summer was predicted to be a long one. She and Ned had years with their children to enjoy the sunshine and the summer snows. Of course, summer wouldn’t last forever. She knew that. She had married a Stark, after all. She knew the Stark words. _Winter is coming._

Yet, as her son played outside, her older daughter likely wheedled lemoncakes out of poor Septa Mordane, her younger daughter slept peacefully in her room, and her newest child rested safely in her womb, Catelyn couldn’t be frightened of winter. As her husband made love to her once more, she knew that as long as her children grew up strong and happy, and she could have Ned’s arms around her, winter could never touch her. As her body moved with her husband’s, they responded to each other with the ease of two dancers who’d long ago perfected this dance, and her heart was filled with nothing but love and hope. On a day like today, Catelyn Stark could see only joy in her future.


	11. To Feel Love Grow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is another pregnancy related drabble taking place earlier in Ned's and Catelyn's marriage--also canon compliant. This one was a response to this prompt: I'd love some pregnant!Cat. First time the child moves within her and Ned is here to feel it?

“My lady! You should not be carrying him!” Ned jumped up from the chair behind his desk and hurried to grab Robb from her arms.

The boy was happy enough to go to his father. The two-year old’s insistent demands for “Papa!” are what had brought her to the lord’s solar after all, but Catelyn sighed. She was far enough along with this new babe that she no longer felt ill of a morning and had recovered her usual energy, but still early enough that she had not yet developed aches in her back or that general sense of being huge and uncoordinated that she remembered from her last time. There was no reason she couldn’t hold her son, but neither she nor Maester Luwin seemed able to convince Ned of that fact.

“I am sorry to interrupt you, my lord,” she said as Ned tossed the copper headed tot into the air, causing high pitched giggles to echo through the room, “But he has been begging for you since he awakened, and I simply couldn’t distract him from the idea any longer.”

“Truly?” Ned asked with such obvious delight in his eyes at the idea of his son wanting his attention that Catelyn felt that now familiar skip of her heart that occurred whenever she was struck by how much she’d come to care for her quiet, solemn, northern husband. She knew that most high lords would hardly welcome the arrival of a demanding toddler into the midst of their work, and she loved him for being so surprisingly enchanted by their little boy’s every word and action.

He caught Robb after tossing him up and turned to look at her. As if he’d read her mind, he said, “You and our son are always welcome here, Cat. You need make no apologies for coming here ever, my lady.”

His use of her name made her flush with pleasure for she rarely heard it from him outside her bedchamber.

“But I insist you sit down,” he continued. “I will not have you tiring yourself needlessly.”

“I am not tired, Ned,” she told him as she sat down in the chair he indicated, enjoying the sound of his name on her tongue in this casual exchange. “And I am not made of glass. I am hardly the first woman to carry a child. I’ve done it before myself, you know, and I survived it quite well.”

“I was not there to watch over you then,” he said seriously, keeping his grey eyes on hers. “But I assure you I will do so this time.”

Not for the first time, she wondered if he’d been with his bastard’s mother while she carried the boy, and she pushed such thoughts forcefully away. What once had been a deep resentment at the slight to her honor had become a different kind of pain as her feelings for her husband had grown. “As long as you remember I am not made of glass,” she said. “As I believe I reminded you last night, my lord.” She blushed as she said it, but was rewarded by that smoky look in the depths of those grey eyes that warmed her all over.

“Indeed, my lady,” he said huskily. “I had missed you, you know, but I would not risk you or the babe.”

She smiled at him. Until last night, he had not shared her bed since she’d told him about the babe, and that had frightened her. When he held her against him at night, whispering her name into her hair as he moved within her, she knew he desired her. She knew in those moments that he felt something, whatever it might be, that was for her alone—not for the lady of his castle or the mother of his heir.

The thought of losing that was unacceptable, and when her assurances to him had fallen on deaf ears, she had swallowed her pride, ignored her embarrassment, and asked Maester Luwin to intercede on her behalf. The good maester had seemed more embarrassed than she had at their conversation, but had assured her she had the right of it and promised to speak with her husband.

Apparently he had, for Ned had come to her chambers last night, stammering, hesitant, and ridiculously apologetic about it, but obviously wanting her. She’d finally managed to convince him that she wanted him as well, and before long she’d made him forget all his hesitancy. She smiled now, looking at his eyes, and sharing with him the memory of the night before. She had no doubts about where he’d be spending tonight.

Robb, aggravated by his father’s sudden silence and stillness let out a wail, and struggled to get down. As he ran across the room, Ned followed him, reaching up to take two carved wooden horses down off a shelf which Robb accepted with glee. They had been Ned’s when he was a boy, and Robb always wanted to play with them when he came to the solar. Catelyn had at first been afraid of his breaking them, but Ned had assured her there was little their son could do to them that he hadn’t already done himself years ago.

As she watched her ordinarily so serious husband drop to the floor beside the boy and make a loud horse noise, she laughed out loud, wondering if anything could ever bring her more joy than the sight of that dark head bent over the little copper colored one in play. Even as the thought formed, she felt the little thump low in her belly, and her eyes widened.

She hadn’t known what it was with Robb. Not at first. But she remembered it, recognizing it now, and she sat very still and waited for it to come again. It did, and she drew in her breath sharply.

“My lady?” Ned looked up at her in concern at the sound.

“Come here, Ned,” she whispered, not wanting to move. “Quickly.”

He was at her side in an instant, his ordinarily unreadable face looking terrified. “Catelyn, what is wrong?”

“Nothing, my love. Give me your hand.” She grabbed his hand and laid it on her belly where she’d felt the little movements. “Now be still and wait.” _I called him my love,_ she realized. That was something she tried to keep to herself for she didn’t wish to make things awkward between them when they had inched their way so painstakingly to a certain ease with each other.

“What is it?” He knelt beside her, still looking frightened and now confused, and she realized he didn’t know what she was showing him. _Has he never done this before?_ she wondered, and that prospect filled her with a ridiculous amount of satisfaction.

“Your child, my lord,” she said, smiling. “Just wait.” Almost as she said it, the little thump came again and Ned literally jerked his hand away from her belly. Then he looked at her with such an expression of wonder and joy on his face that she felt quite dizzy just looking at him.

“That is the babe? Our babe?” he asked her, swallowing hard.

“It is. Have you never felt a baby’s kicking before, Ned?” She could remember her mother putting her hands on her belly to feel Edmure’s kicking, and the next baby, too—the one that had died with Mother. She couldn’t hold on to any sad thoughts, though, watching Ned’s face now.

“I think Mother showed us with Benjen,” he said slowly. “I don’t remember it much. But this …” He put his hand back down on her gently. “This is extraordinary.” The babe chose that moment to kick her again, even harder, and he laughed out loud. “Our babe,” he said, looking at her.

“Our babe,” she replied softly, realizing that her jealousy over his bastard’s mother was unfounded in this one thing, at least. Eddard Stark had obviously never felt his own child move within the womb before.

He leaned in then and kissed her full on the lips. It was a gentle kiss, but passionate all the same, the kind of kiss she had never received from him before outside her bedchamber. His arms tightened around her, and she put hers around him, returning the kiss with enthusiasm.

“Papa! Mama!” Robb shouted, flinging himself at them.

Ned jumped back from her as Robb tugged at her skirts. “I . . I am sorry, my lady,” he stammered.

“Well, I am not,” she told him firmly. Robb was now flailing his fists at her legs wanting to be picked up. “I am being beaten upon by both of your children, my lord, from within and without, and I suffer no hurt from it. I am hardly too frail to be kissed by my husband.”

He smiled at her then, and she marveled as she always did at how completely his smiles transformed his face. His eyes once more went the color of smoke as he replied. “I am most glad to hear that, my lady.”

He moved to pick up Robb then, and set him gently in her lap. He took Robb’s little hand in one of his and put his other arm around her. “Now, my little man,” he said very seriously to the toddler. “If you can keep very still, I shall let you feel a most wondrous thing.”

As her husband placed the boy’s little hand on her belly and spread his large hand over it, Catelyn Stark knew an even deeper joy than she had before, and she silently thanked the gods for the gifts she’d been given.


	12. Jealousy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was written in response to this prompt: Cat's jealous of a kitchen maid with an obvious crush on the utterly oblivious Lord Stark.
> 
> I'd written jealous!Ned a number of times, but this was my first go at jealous!Cat, and it was actually a lot of fun! :)

“So where did you and Lord Eddard get off to last night?”

The teasing question stopped Catelyn in her tracks when she overheard the maid ask it. She leaned cautiously around the corner to see the speaker and felt sick to her stomach when she recognized the girl to whom the question had been addressed.

The girl couldn’t be more than six and ten. She was shorter and a bit rounder than Catelyn with generous breasts and hips that swayed when she walked, and to Catelyn’s mind, swayed a great deal more than necessary whenever she walked past the Lord of Winterfell.

Her name was Ilsa, and she wanted Catelyn’s husband. At first, Catelyn had tried to convince herself she was imagining things. Her emotions were simply overwrought after Rickon’s birth. The girl was simply anxious to prove herself in her new position at the castle. She’d tried to believe those things until she couldn’t.

She’d sat through dinner the night before quietly seething as the girl served Ned every dish, leaning over him so that her breasts brushed his shoulder, smiling at him, showing him a new ribbon in her hair and asking if he liked it.

“It is very pretty,” he had replied in his solemn voice, and Catelyn had wanted to slap him for it.

He’d leaned over to her a bit after that and touched her arm. “You are very quiet tonight, my love. Are you well?”

“I wasn’t aware you lacked for conversation, my lord,” she’d said shortly, realizing how like a shrew she sounded only after the words were said.

Ned had only frowned slightly. “Are you tired, Cat? Shall I walk you to your room?”

“You’d like me to leave, wouldn’t you?” She was being completely irrational and she knew it.

Ned had looked confused, but he didn’t get angry with her. He merely reached out and touched her face. “I would keep you with me always, my lady, but I won’t have you over tired. I know the babe has been keeping you up nights.”

 _How would you know? You aren’t there!_ Now that was a terribly unfair thought, and she’d known it. Ned had been staying with her in spite of the fact that she was not yet allowed to lie with him as his wife. He had only returned to his own room four nights ago at her insistence, when Rickon’s night time crying had gotten completely out of hand and she could see no reason for both of them to be deprived of sleep.

She had bitten her tongue, afraid of what hateful thing might come out of her mouth, and Ned had taken her silence as an indication she did wish to be escorted back to her rooms. He’d risen and offered her his arm which she’d taken.

He’d stayed with her for a long time in her chambers, holding Rickon and speaking to her of inconsequential things. After the babe had nursed, he had taken him from her again and put him into the cradle asleep. “You should sleep now, too, my lady,” he’d told her. “Who knows when the pup will wake hungry again?”

“Very well,” she’d said tiredly. “I shall see you in the morning, my lord.”

He’d looked vaguely disappointed at that, and she felt guilty. “I shall look forward to it, my lady,” he said softly.

He’d bent to kiss her, and the feel of his lips on hers had almost caused her to beg him to stay, but instead she only said, “You should go back to the Hall, Ned. I know you didn’t eat your fill.”

He’d chuckled softly at her. “You know me so well, Cat. Perhaps I will. But I would rather have been here with you and young Rickon than at a great feast, you know.”

“I know,” she’d smiled. _I think I know. I hope I know._

After he left, she’d undressed for bed, looking at herself critically in the looking glass. Her breasts were likely as large as young Ilsa’s at present as they were full of milk for Rickon, but she doubted the girl’s sagged as heavily. And where the roundness of Ilsa’s hips caught the eye, it was Catelyn’s belly which was her roundest feature still, just under a moon’s turn after Rickon’s birth.

She hated being unavailable to her husband. Men did have needs, after all. Ned had never taken any woman into his bed that she knew of at Winterfell. She liked to think of that as a mark of his devotion to her, but on her darker days she wondered if it were more from devotion to the memory of his bastard’s mother.

“You are being unfair, Catelyn Tully Stark,” she’d said out loud to her reflection. “The man has given you no reason to doubt him since you’ve been at Winterfell these long years.”

Yet when she looked at her reflection, she saw the little lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth. She was past thirty now. Young Ilsa’s soft face and pink lips had no lines. As she grew older and her beauty faded, wouldn’t it be natural for Ned to be more tempted by such a girl?

She’d slept restlessly, but at least Rickon had sympathetically slept better than the previous nights, and she’d met the morning intending to put her foolish worries behind her.

Yet now she was hiding behind a wall in her own castle listening to the gossip of a chamber maid and a kitchen girl.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Ilsa said with exaggerated innocence.

“Oh, come on, Ilsa. Everyone saw the two of you leave together,” the other girl said.

 _Leave together?_ Catelyn thought miserably. _Everyone saw?_

“I don’t kiss and tell,” Ilsa said smugly, and Catelyn felt her heart sink.

Both girls laughed hysterically after that, and as they moved off down the corridor, Catelyn heard Ilsa say something about a greatsword which caused the other girl to shriek, and Catelyn felt her cheeks burning. She couldn’t stay indoors. She ran out of the Great Keep and through the courtyard. She realized she was crying and likely making a spectacle of herself, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. She wanted to get away from everyone, and so found herself heading into the godswood. She disliked the place, but she could not think of anywhere she could be more alone.

Of course, she wandered right to Ned’s stupid heart tree which did nothing but make her think of him. She sank down on the ground beside the pool there and simply cried. After awhile, she realized she was shivering. It was summer, but that hardly meant a shady grove of trees was comfortably warm in the early morning without any cloak at all here in the North.

She had almost convinced herself to go back to the Keep when she heard the deep voice behind her. “What troubles you, my love?”

She looked up to see him standing there, such genuine appearing concern for her on his face that it broke her heart and made her angry all at once. “How can you even ask me that?” she said.

He looked confused. “I am sorry, Cat, if I’ve done something to upset you. Tell me what it is and I will apologize.”

“Apologize? Apologize!?” She got to her feet then and ran to beat at his chest with her fists. “How dare you offer to apologize for … for …” She couldn’t even say the words, and instead started crying again.

Ned had grabbed her wrists. “Cat,” he said desperately. “I do not know what has upset you, my love. Please tell me what I’ve done.”

She looked up at him and saw even more concern in his eyes. He’d never seen her behave this way. She never did behave this way. Likely, he thought she’d come unhinged, and maybe she had, but that didn’t mean that he had any right to … “Ilsa!” she shouted at him and waited for him to react to the name.

His face went blank with confusion. “Who?” he said after a moment.

“Ilsa,” she repeated. “Ilsa from the kitchens. Your little tramp!”

“From the kitchens …” he said slowly. “Oh! The new girl who …my little what?” he asked her suddenly as if he’d only just realized what she’d said last.

“Tramp! Don’t tell me you don’t know what I’m talking about, Eddard Stark. Everyone saw the two of you leave together!”

“Leave together?” he said helplessly in that same puzzled voice. Then she saw something click. “Oh,” he said. “That.”

“Yes,” she said coldly. “That.”

He had the nerve to laugh. “Catelyn, as I left the Great Hall last night after going to find something more to eat, as you requested I do, I heard the new little girl cry out in the corridor. She’d twisted her ankle, and I helped her up to her room.” He looked at her rather severely. “I assure you I did not enter her room, my lady.”

“Why not?”

“Why not? Catelyn, why would I? I’ve never so much as looked at the girl! I don’t even know her name!”

“Ilsa,” Catelyn said again.

“Ilsa,” he repeated dully. He reached out to put his hands on her arms, and she let him. “Where is this coming from, Cat?”

“The little chit all but told another maid this morning that she’d had you. You can’t seriously believe she was really hurt last night. Don’t tell me you don’t find her attentions flattering.”

“If the girl is telling lies, I’ll have her sent away,” Ned said gravely. “I won’t have such wicked tongues in my castle. But what attentions? What are you talking about, Cat?”

Catelyn affected a high-pitched young flirtatious voice. “You look so handsome this evening, Lord Stark. Do you like my ribbon, Lord Stark? A big, strong man such as you must have more to eat, Lord Stark! Is the soup to your liking, Lord Stark? I made it especially for you, my lord!”

Ned was laughing again, damn him. “Did she honestly say all that?” he asked her. “Poor child. I swear I never heard it, Cat.”

“You answered her!” she shouted at him.

“I paid no attention,” he said. “I’d have probably laughed at the poor girl if I did. Gods, Cat! I don’t even recall what she looks like, but I do know she’s practically a child.

“She’s young,” Catelyn said quietly. “I’m old.”

“Old? Did you not have my babe less than a moon’s turn ago? You are hardly aged, my love.”

She sniffed, but did not reply.

“Catelyn, look at me.”

She raised her eyes to his, and he put his hands on her face. “This is the only woman’s face I can recall in detail whenever I close my eyes,” he said. “This is the only woman’s face I care to look upon for any length of time. No other could be as fair, and this one belongs to me.” He kissed her then, and she let him.

The kiss deepened as if he needed to prove to her how much he desired her, and Catelyn felt herself responding in spite of herself. As she wound her arms around his neck and ran her tongue across his, he moaned and pressed her to him. She could feel the hardness in his breeches, and her insecurity came racing back.

“But you can’t truly have me,” she said, pulling away. “Not now. And I know that men have needs.”

“Needs?” he asked her, his breathing still ragged. He looked at her as if he could devour her in one bite, as if he truly were the wolf on his sigil. “Oh, I have needs, my lady. I need you like I need air to breathe and water to drink.” He reached out and touched her face again. “But I am a man, Cat, not a beast. I can wait for you. I have waited before, and I can wait again, for I want no other. It is only you that I need, my love. I am of the North, and winter makes a man patient, you know. It also makes a man appreciate the summer. You are summer to me, Cat. No one else could be.”

He was telling the truth. She could hear it. Her husband had his faults but deceitfulness was not one of them. Secrets they might have between them, but not lies. “Forgive me, my lord,” she said softly. “I’ve behaved foolishly.”

“There is nothing to forgive.” He smiled at her. “Shall I send the girl away?”

“No,” Catelyn sighed. “That would only lend credence to her idle talk. I shall deal with her.”

“Ah,” he said with a small chuckle. “I do pity the girl now.”

She made a face at him, and he laughed. Holding out his arm, he then said, “Shall we go and break our fast, my lady?”

“Yes, my lord,” she said. As they began to walk out of the godswood, she added, “I do wish I could be your wife in all ways again, Ned.”

“You are my wife in all ways,” he told her. “And as for bedding you, well I have only a fortnight and two days left to wait,” he said wickedly.

“You are counting?” she asked him in disbelief.

He smiled at her. “I am of the North and I am patient. I am, however, neither frozen nor dead.” His grey eyes lit up with amusement. “And I confess, my lady, that I have rather enjoyed your being jealous over me. I should thank the poor, deluded girl for giving you the slightest taste of what I am given by every man who so much as looks at you.”

“You imagine things.”

“I am hardly prone to flights of fancy.”

“No, I suppose not,” she said with a laugh.

As they reached the gate to the courtyard, she stopped him. Suddenly, while she still had him to herself, she simply needed him to know. She needed to say the words that were spoken so seldom between them, but were no less true for that.

“I love you, Ned,” she said. “Only you.”

“And I you, my lady,” he replied with a smile. “Only you.”


	13. To Hold My Lady's Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This little ficlet was born of this prompt: Cat x Ned: something happens in the North (rare heat spell, trader with familiar goods) that makes Cat think of home, and allows Ned to know more about his Southron bride. Early marriage, maybe post-rebellion?
> 
> I set this story post-Greyjoy Rebellion, and the Lord of Winterfell most definitely wants to learn all he can about his southron lady as he realizes he loves her more and more.

Eddard Stark looked at the woman riding beside him, long auburn hair falling out of her braid and down around her shoulders, a smile lighting her face as she looked at the lush green world around them and knew he’d made the right decision.

He thought he might be content to simply watch her in silence forever, but he forced himself to speak. “I am glad you decided to join me, my lady.”

She turned that smile upon him, and he felt that odd catch in his breath that she seemed so easily able to provoke. “I am glad, too, my lord,” she told him. Then she bit her lower lip, something he’d come to recognize as a sign of deep thought or worry. “You are certain we can make it back to Castle Cerwyn by dark? I don’t want to leave little Arya any longer.”

“On a day like today?” he asked her. “We will be back easily, my lady. Especially as well as you ride.”

She did ride well, but he had known that already. Apparently she could rule the North just as well. Since his return to Winterfell from the Iron Islands, Maester Luwin had not stopped talking of how well Catelyn had done administering his castle and lands in his absence. Ned had nearly begun to believe the man thought she made a better lord than he did for all he went on about her abilities. And, of course, she’d birthed a babe during his absence as well. She truly was remarkable, this Tully bride of his.

He’d thought he’d noted a definite softening in her attitude toward him before he left to fight the Greyjoys, and she had certainly welcomed him home enthusiastically, seeming genuinely glad to see him. Yet, his absence from Winterfell had caused some of the old distance between them to come back. He had seen her face when he presented Theon Greyjoy. She knew who the child was, of course. He had written her of him before his arrival. But he could see clearly enough the memory of his bringing home another boy from another war in the pained expression on her face. She did not trust him when he was away from her, and he could not blame her.

She’d presented him with a second daughter, and he’d caught a slight note of disappointment in her voice and expression when she did so. As he’d looked at the girl she’d named Arya and noted she appeared entirely Stark, he’d had a momentary fear that her disappointment was that the babe looked like him rather than like herself and their two beautiful Tully colored older children. He was soon relieved of that concern when he realized her fear was that he would be disappointed in another girl. He did his best to reassure her that nothing was further from the truth, but he wasn’t sure she believed him.

She’d welcomed him back to her bed as soon as Maester Luwin had said she was recovered from Arya’s birth, and he knew well enough that she enjoyed that aspect of their marriage as well as he did, but she had remained a bit more pensive and distant than she had been just prior to his leaving and he’d sought ways to bridge that gap. The simple truth was that he discovered he had deep feelings for his southron bride, and he found himself dissatisfied with the idea of having little more than a respectful partnership through the years. Even the closeness they found in their marriage bed left him wanting more. He wanted to be able to reach her just as easily in other ways.

When Lord Cerwyn had written asking him to come, she’d grown even more distant, and he realized she didn’t want him to leave her again. He’d asked her to come with him, and while she’d looked pleased enough, she had first said she could not leave Arya. He’d pointed out to her that Castle Cerwyn was very near to Winterfell, and that with spring rapidly giving way to true summer, the weather would be mild enough for them to bring the babe along. After several discussions, he not only convinced her to come, but convinced her to leave Robb and Sansa with Septa Mordane at Winterfell so that she would have only Arya to look after during their short trip.

She’d cried upon leaving, and he’d feared he’d made a terrible error in judgment, but as the day of their departure grew warmer, and she’d thrown back her hood, he’d seen her smile again. They’d made Castle Cerwyn that evening with plans to stay two days to conclude his business with Lord Cerwyn before heading home on the fourth day. Arya, thank the gods, had proved to be a sturdy little traveler, seeming content out of doors, swaddled against her mother. She also had taken quite well to one of the maids at Castle Cerwyn whose own babe was still on the teat, and while Catelyn didn’t generally care for other women feeding her children, she had allowed the girl to feed their daughter enough that she could participate in all the feasts and entertainment Lord Cerwyn had arranged for them.

Late in the evening of their first full day, before they retired, everyone was commenting on the unseasonable warmth. In truth, it was even warmer than most midsummer days and positively unprecedented for the first days of summer. One of Lord Cerwyn’s men mentioned that the rapidly warming temperatures and subsequent rapidly melting snows had swelled the little western fork of the White Knife which was normally little more than a stream at its nearest point to the castle into quite the respectable river.

Ned heard his lady wife sigh, and when he looked at her, she had a wistful expression on her face. “What are you thinking of, my lady?” he’d asked her.

She’d smiled at him, too caught up in her memories to be guarded in her response. “Only that I would love to see a river again, my lord.” Quickly, she had added, “Not that I am discontent at Winterfell in any way, my lord. It is lovely, and I can think of no better place to raise our children. It’s only …”

“It’s only that you miss your home,” he said softly. “Particularly now, I would imagine, as this weather seems more suited to the Riverlands than the North.” He’d reached for her hand. “You needn’t explain yourself, my lady. I understand entirely.”

She’d smiled at him then, one of her breathtaking smiles, and he’d determined he’d get her to smile like that again soon.

So, he’d informed Lord Cerwyn of a change in plans. Rather than continuing the discussions about his numerous concerns with Lord Bolton’s men recently hunting and engaging in other activities on Cerwyn land (all likely well founded, Ned knew), he would be riding out with his lady wife to see the White Knife. He’d awakened Catelyn early, given little Arya to the nursemaid, and all but ordered his lady wife to accompany him on a ride to the river.

The day was even warmer than the day before, uncomfortably warm to Ned, but Catelyn seemed to glow in the sunlight, her hair reflecting its beams and her eyes twin mirrors of the sky above them. They spoke little, but the silence was not uncomfortable. They rode close together, and several times when she spied a bird or flower that caught her fancy, she’d reached out and touched him to draw his attention to it. He could not recall passing such a pleasant morning in a very long time.

Suddenly, her expression changed. She listened intently to something, and then grinned at him and kicked her horse, racing ahead of him. He was stunned for a moment, but then he heard it, too—-the sound of a river, water tumbling over rocks and rushing toward the distant sea—-a sound never heard in the quiet pools of Winterfell.

He smiled to himself and rode after her.

When he reached the bank of the obviously swollen river, his heart nearly stopped for he saw her horse standing beside the water with no sign of his lady wife anywhere. Had she been thrown into the rushing water?

“Ned!” He turned when he heard her call his name and saw, to his amazement, that she was standing in nothing but her shift, her bare feet in the water, dress in a pile on the higher ground behind her.

“My lady, come back from there before you fall!” he shouted in alarm, likely sounding angrier than he intended.

She only smiled, though. “I won’t fall,” she said, taking another step forward and sinking into water up to her knees.

“Catelyn!” he said sharply. “I forbid you to go any further. That water is freezing, my lady.”

She raised her brows at him. “I know how cold it is better than you, my lord. I am the one standing in it.” Then, with a brilliant smile she turned away and dove forward into the water, submerging herself completely.

“Cat!” he shouted desperately. He couldn’t see her anywhere. Had she been swept away in the current? Frantically, he started pulling at his doublet. He could paddle around the still pools at Winterfell well enough, but he’d never actually swum a great deal in a river. He prayed he could get to her. He almost had the doublet off when he heard a laugh coming from slightly upstream.

He looked in the direction of the sound and saw his wife’s head. She had surfaced almost in the center of the river, upstream of where she had gone in. Her wet hair was slicked down the back of her head as she allowed the current to carry her toward him.

“You …you went upstream,” he said stupidly.

“Of course,” she called over the water. “Always swim upstream. Then if you tire, you only have to let the current bring you back.” She dove under the water again, looking for all the world like some graceful aquatic creature, and he began to understand where tales of mermaids came from. Still, he counted the seconds until she surfaced again, this time directly in front of him.

Close up, he could see the expression on her face was one of bliss. However, he could also see that her normally pale skin was white as marble and her lips were blue. “Catelyn, come out of there,” he insisted. “That water is too cold for swimming. You’ll freeze.”

“It is too cold,” she agreed reluctantly. “But, Ned, it feels glorious anyway!” She launched herself up and backwards then, arching her back into a backward flip beneath the water. When she surfaced again, the expression on her face looked oddly familiar to him. “Oh, Ned!” she cried. “Thank you!”

He recognized the expression then. It was the same which appeared on the face of their two year old daughter when she was presented with a pretty doll or an unexpected lemoncake—-pure joy, untainted by any practical thoughts or sensible worries. He had to smile at her in spite of his own worries for her, and he smiled more broadly as he realized she was making for the bank.

Quickly, he went to retrieve the blanket from his saddlebag. He’d brought it to spread on the ground for her to sit upon, never guessing his proper lady wife would hurl herself nearly naked into frigid water and then require it to wrap up in.

When he returned with the blanket, she was climbing out of the water, shivering violently. “Take off that wet shift,” he ordered. She managed to look scandalized even as she shivered, and he smothered a laugh. “I have seen you naked, my lady, and no one else is around. Now take off that wet garment before you freeze.”

She tried to grab at the hem of the shift which clung to her tightly, but her fingers were shaking too badly, and she looked at him helplessly. He laid down the blanket and went to her, carefully pulling the wet material over her head. Standing there naked in the sunlight, she both looked and felt like a river goddess carved from ice. He wrapped his arms tightly around her and virtually carried her to where he’d left the blanket. Then he lay down on the grass wrapping both himself and the blanket around her.

They simply lay there in silence until her shivering calmed and he began to feel some warmth spreading into her skin again. “That was foolishly done, my lady,” he said gruffly.

“I know,” she whispered. “Forgive me. But I hadn’t truly been swimming in so long. It brought back such memories.”

“You are forgiven, my lady. But promise you will not do that again.” He tilted her head up to look into her eyes. “I thought I’d lost you.” The last sentence came out in a hoarse voice, and he realized just how terrified he’d been.

She looked at him, and her entire face seemed to soften. “You won’t lose me, Ned.”

After a few moments, he allowed himself to smile at her again. “I knew your House Sigil was a leaping trout, my lady, but I had no idea you Tullys were actually descended from the damn things.”

She laughed. “Mayhaps we are, my lord. Lysa and Edmure and I were all swimming as soon as we were able to toddle into the river, you know.”

She had completely stopped shivering then and she pushed herself up on one elbow. “We would swim until we were exhausted and then we’d lie in the sun to dry like this.” She flopped back onto the blanket on her back, arms extended over her head, giving him a delightful view of her naked breasts.

“Exactly like that?” he asked her, arching a brow as he now rose up on his elbow, the better to look down at her.

“Well …” He saw that enough blood flow had returned to her skin to allow her to blush. “When we were very small,” she said. “Once we were older, swimming entirely naked was frowned upon.”

“I’m not frowning,” he said, the corners of his mouth twitching upward as he began to circle one stiff nipple with his fingers.

“Mayhaps,” she said. “But you are overdressed, I fear.”

He wasn’t overdressed for more than a few seconds once she made that statement, and he considered everything he did afterward to be only what any man ought to do if he found himself beneath a blue sky and uncharacteristically warm sun with his beautiful wife stretched out naked beside him. Neither of them spoke again for a long time unless you counted the times they breathed each other’s names.

Afterward, she lay curled up against him. The sun was past its highest point, and he knew they should eat the food he’d brought and then start back to Castle Cerwyn.

“Thank you for this, Ned,” she said quietly.

“You are most welcome, my lady,” he said. “Cat,” he added with a smile.

He sat up then and watched her stretch lazily before sitting up to join him. He pressed a kiss to her lips. “We must dress and return to the castle now. No doubt, our daughter will be looking for us. For you, anyway.”

“For us,” she said, smiling at him. “She looks like you. Perhaps our next child will be a son who looks like you.”

He knew the fact that Jon looked like him troubled her. He wished he could put her mind at ease about that, but he did not know how he could, so instead he said, “Summer should stretch out a good few years now, my lady. When our little one is just a bit bigger, we shall travel to Riverrun and visit with your lord father and your brother. Then you can teach our children to swim in waters not so likely to give them frostbite.”

“Truly?” she said, her blue eyes lighting up.

“Truly,” he answered. He gently ran his hand through her still damp hair. “I would do much to make you happy, Cat. You are …important to me.”

This time she leaned up to kiss him, and as their lips met, he knew he had crossed a lot of that distance between them. He had learned to know his wife a bit better today, and gods willing would learn to know her even more tomorrow and the next day. For now, he was content in the knowledge that on this particular day, he had held not only her body, but a bit of her heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is now a sequel to this story which is posted as Chapter 20 of this collection and is entitled "To Give My Lord My Heart." It was requested by mindlesscondrum in a prompt on tumblr and tells of the events which take place immediately at this story's end.


	14. Same Day, Same Lie, On and On We Go

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This ficlet was written in response to this prompt: Cat/Ned - Groundhog Day/time travel
> 
> I really didn't have any brilliant time travel ideas, but the Groundhog Day movie premise intrigued me. If Ned Stark had to live a single day over and over, what might he learn from it? What might he want to change?

Ned Stark woke beside his wife, and reached out to tenderly touch the copper tendrils of her hair as she slept. It was warm in her chambers, so he left the comfort of her bed to go to the windows and open them wide. Outside, a deep layer of fresh snow covered the earth.

 _Odd,_ he thought. Not that it was odd to get snows in early spring, but odd that the same deep, new snow would appear two mornings in a row.

“Come back to bed, my lord,” a sleepy voice beckoned from behind him.

He turned, startled by her use of the same words she had used the previous morning. He had only recently begun remaining in her bed through the night, and her acceptance of him still surprised him. He was pleased she seemed to have forgotten their argument from the night before. She was smiling at him now, and he went to her without hesitation.

“You do not tire of my company, my lady?”

“You haven’t been home from your travels long, my lord. And since you insist upon making my room so cold, I would have you come and warm me before I must rise and prepare for the feast today.”

He slid beneath the furs and took her into his arms, pleased enough that she wanted him in her bed, but puzzled by her words. They’d celebrated the arrival of the raven which announced the coming of spring yesterday. They’d feasted well into the night. What feast did she mean?

The touch of her lips on his neck caused him to cease worrying about it as he allowed the needs of his body to supersede those of his mind, and he pulled himself above her, losing himself in her arms and riding the wave of sensation as they came together to its inevitable and breathtaking crest.

Afterwards, as he rolled off her, a knock came at the door, and he cursed the bad timing of her maids two days running. He would have liked to have held her to him longer.

“Come in,” Catelyn called, pulling the furs over both of them.

“Forgive me, my lady. My lord,” the maid said, blushing and not meeting their eyes, “But the cook is wanting you, my lady. Something about the third course. And Hullen wants you in the stables, my lord. Master Tallheart’s big gelding has come up lame, and there’s some dispute as to how it happened. Hullen’s not happy about the man questioning his care of the horses, my lord.”

Ned was sitting up staring at her in disbelief. This was identical to the speech she had greeted them with the previous morning, and it was far less likely to be a coincidence than a second nocturnal snowfall or even a second morning of lovemaking initiated by his lady wife. A feeling of cold dread settled in his gut as he asked her the same questions and received the same responses he had received before.

He dressed quickly and went to the stables, dealing with the same argument between Master Tallheart and Hullen before going to the Great Hall and breaking his fast with the same food and conversation that he remembered from the day before.

It did not surprise him when Sansa came to him in the afternoon with a tearstained dress wailing that her brothers were fighting. Nor did it surprise him when he took her hand, and she led him to the godswood where he found six year old Robb and Jon engaged in a bout of fisticuffs with ten year old Theon Greyjoy. He shouted at them, but even as he did, he knew that Greyjoy’s fist would connect with Robb’s face before he could stop it, and that Robb’s eye would be blackened and swollen shut.

Later, as Catelyn held a snowpack over Robb’s face, and she asked him yet again what had provoked him to fight Theon, Ned steeled himself against his son’s answer and his wife’s response to it.

“He called Jon a bastard!” Robb finally yelled, in response to his mother’s repeated questioning. “He called Jon a filthy bastard and said his mother was a whore and he didn’t belong in Winterfell. And I wasn’t going to let anyone say such a thing to my brother!”

Ned watched Catelyn’s face go white. All of them were silent for what seemed a long time, and Ned wanted to speak. He wanted to stop his wife’s next words, but he didn’t know how.

“Jon Snow is a bastard, Robb,” she said finally, the words as cold as they were quiet. “He is the child of a woman your father took to bed outside of marriage. That makes him a bastard. As to his presence in Winterfell, that is your father’s doing. As your father is Lord of Winterfell, it is his place to say who belongs here, and not Theon Greyjoy’s.”

She was shaking slightly as she finished speaking, and she turned and left the room without another word. Ned looked down at his son and cursed the gods for somehow making him have this conversation twice.

“Is that true, Father?” Robb asked in a small voice. “What Mother said?”

“Your lady mother would never lie to you,” he said brusquely. “Never.” _Although it seems your father must._

“Come here, Robb.” The boy came slowly to him, still holding the snow pack his mother had left behind. Ned struggled to find better words than he’d found the day before. “Do you know what it means to be a bastard?” he asked.

“I know it’s bad. I know that Mother is not Jon’s mother.” Robb looked down at his feet, and Ned stared at his beautiful auburn curls, so similar in color to his mother’s hair.

“What do you know of babes and how they are made, Robb?”

“I …nothing really. Theon says a man does with his wife what a stallion does with a mare. I …I don’t know if I believe him.”

Ned gently turned his son’s face up toward his and noted the boy’s cheeks were flushed bright red.

“It isn’t exactly the same,” he said haltingly, “between a man and a woman. But Theon is not entirely wrong.” He sighed. “A man should lie with no woman but his wife and bring children only to her. Do you understand, Robb?”

Robb nodded solemnly. “But …how is it that Jon …” He couldn’t even ask the question.

“I dishonored myself. I dishonored your mother. The fault is mine and mine alone. Jon is blameless. That is all you need to know.”

“But …Jon’s mother …”

“That is all you need to know,” Ned said, far more sternly.

“Yes, Father,” Robb mumbled, and then he left as his mother had before.

He did not seek out Catelyn any more than he had the day before, and so he saw her next at the feast, looking so beautiful that she took his breath away. He knew she fretted that her gowns were still tighter than they had been as Arya was only three moons old, but he found no fault with her appearance. He only felt dismayed by the thin line of her lips when she looked at Robb’s black eye and the way she stiffened when he tried to take her hand beneath the table.

The feast passed precisely as he remembered, which meant that it passed pleasantly enough, but that he was aware of his wife’s unhappiness throughout, and it broke his heart. He was almost glad when it was time to escort her to her chambers, even though he knew what was to come.

“You looked wonderful tonight, my lady,” he told her as he opened the door to her rooms.

“Thank you, my lord,” she said. Her voice was cold courtesy, and it stung him as deeply as it had the first time.

“I am sorry, my love,” he said.

At that, her cool reserve broke, and she turned on him. “Sorry for what, my lord? For lying with that boy’s mother? For bringing your bastard into my home? For refusing to answer me ever about him?” She bit her lip and fought to keep tears from her eyes. “Or are you only sorry that I was asked on numerous occasions tonight how our son’s eye happened to be blackened?”

“Catelyn …I …”

“Do not speak to me. I do not wish to discuss this.” She turned away from him then. “That should please you,” she said softly. “As the gods know you will never discuss Jon Snow.”

He swallowed. He’d said nothing the night before. He hadn’t known what to say. He’d simply watched her undress and climb into bed, and then he’d climbed in beside her. She’d not protested his staying, just as he knew she wouldn’t. Catelyn was above all a dutiful woman, and she would not deny her husband. He hadn’t taken her, though. He hadn’t even touched her. He’d only lain beside her and held onto the memory of the morning. Held onto the memory of his wife asking him into her bed.

Now, he wondered if he could change it. “I would stay with you, my lady,” he whispered. “But only if you wish it.”

He’d given her the opening. After a moment, she turned toward him. “I do not,” she said simply.

He left and went to sleep in his own cold, lonely room.

He woke beside his wife in her overwarm chambers. Heart racing, he went to open the windows, and he nearly cried when he heard, “Come back to bed, my lord,” and turned to find her smiling at him once more.

So it went. Ned Stark realized that for some reason he had been cursed to relive this day over and over. He tried any number of times to change the events, and sometimes succeeded. He prevented Robb’s and Jon’s fight with Theon on several occasions, but somehow he and Catelyn always ended up at odds over something concerning Jon by nightfall. And whatever he changed was wiped out at dawn. He woke always with his wife full of love and hope toward him and went to bed either in her chambers or his with his wife hurt and angry. He thought he must surely go mad if it continued.

After too many days (but only one day really), he watched Robb walk away after he told his little son yet again about Jon’s bastardy. He thought about going to check on Jon. He’d done that before, and it hadn’t changed anything. He considered going to fetch little Sansa from Septa Mordane, but the child had been quite traumatized by seeing the fight, and he knew the good Septa had only just gotten her settled. He almost went to the nursery to simply hold little Arya. That had soothed him the first few times he’d done it, but as he’d realized that he may be stuck here forever, that he may never see this precious daughter grow beyond infancy, the comfort he’d taken in holding her had lessened.

Instead, he did something he’d not yet done. He looked for Cat. She was not in her chambers, and she was not in the kitchens or the Hall although preparations for the nights festivities were underway. Finally, it occurred to him to check the sept.

He approached the little seven-sided building with some trepidation. He almost never came here. The Seven were not his gods. He’d built this for her, and he knew it was her refuge as much as a place of worship. When the North became too strange for her, when she longed for the warmer climes and flowing rivers of her youth, she would retreat here. He had never begrudged her that.

He opened the door and saw her kneeling before one of the statues. The Mother. Of course, it would be that one. He felt guilty at disturbing her, and yet he could not walk away without speaking.

“Cat,” he said softly.

She turned to face him, saying nothing.

“I am sorry,” he said. “I am sorry for every moment’s pain I have caused you.”

Tears filled her eyes and she bowed her head once more. “Is his mother dead?” she asked softly, after a moment.

He had forbidden her ever to ask anything of Jon Snow’s mother, and she had never once disobeyed him in that. Until now.

“Yes,” he said just as softly. “She is. He has no one but me.”

She swallowed and looked up at the statue rather than at him. “Did you love her a great deal, my lord?”

Ned felt an odd pounding in his chest, but he dropped to his knees beside her and took her hands. He was reminded oddly of the way they had knelt in the sept at Riverrun when he’d made her his wife. She did not pull away from him, and for that he was grateful.

“I did,” he said, and he felt her stiffen. “But it is not as you think.” He took a deep breath and prepared himself to say the words he’d sworn he would never say. To break the promise he’d kept above all others. To share the secret he’d held most closely. _It_ _does not matter,_ he told himself. _All will be as before when we wake._

“Jon is the son of my sister Lyanna and Rhaegar Targaryen,” he said.

The blue eyes widened in disbelief. “What?”

“He is Lyanna’s son. I claimed him as my own in order to hide him from Robert. I knew not what would happen to a Targaryen babe, and I had promised my sister I would do all in my power to keep him safe.” The words tumbled from him quickly once they started.

Catelyn’s words came more slowly. “So …it has been a lie, then? All I’ve believed? All I told Robb earlier? Nothing but a lie?”

It hurt to hear her speak of it like that. He had never meant it as a lie, only as a promise of safety for the last bit of his sister that remained. Yet, it was a lie, and it had hurt her. He couldn’t deny that. “Yes, my lady,” he said simply. “It was a lie.”

She was silent a long time after that. “My lady?” he finally asked her hesitantly. “Cat?”

“Leave me alone, Ned,” she said softly. “Please.”

He did as she asked, and he did not see her again until he escorted her into the Great Hall yet again for the feast to celebrate the coming of spring. She was beautiful as ever, but quiet and reserved. He could sense she was angry, but she seemed more sad than anything else. When he offered her his arm at the end of the evening, she took it without protest.

In her chambers, she looked at him. “I honestly do not know how I feel,” she said after they’d stood there looking at each other for a few moments.

“I never meant to hurt you, Catelyn.”

“But you did.”

“I did,” he acknowledged.

She sighed. “I think we should go to sleep,” she said after a moment.

She did not ask him to leave and so he didn’t. Instead, they both got undressed and slipped into her large comfortable bed, not touching, but aware of each other’s presence. After some time, she reached out and put her hand on his arm. He knew she thought him asleep, so he didn’t move. He simply took what comfort he could in that touch and waited for morning to erase today’s work.

Morning came, and he went to the windows, not even bothering to look outside as he threw them open against the oppressive heat.

“Come back to bed, my lord,” came her voice as always, and he sighed turning to face her.

She wasn’t smiling. Her expression was serious and somewhat hurt, but her blue eyes had a determined look in them. “Come back to bed, Ned,” she said. “We have much to discuss.”

“My lady?” he asked, hesitant to believe that anything had actually changed.

“What you told me yesterday in the sept. That was the truth?”

She remembered. Yesterday was yesterday. This day was something entirely new. He nearly jumped back into the bed beside her. “It was, my love. I swear to you that I will tell you nothing but truth from now on.”

She nodded, biting her lip. “Then tell me all of it,” she said. “Half the people in the castle will likely sleep until midday after last night. We have time.”

He pulled her to him and simply held her, overwhelmed at the idea that they did indeed have time. She was hurt, he knew, but he would do whatever it took to help her heal. They had a new day. _We have time._


	15. Freaky Friday--Winterfell Edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I got this prompt: "Ned/Cat BODYSWAP. This is gonna be sweet! :D" I honestly didn't know what to do with it, but after some thought I came up with this little drabble.

Ned Stark’s head was pounding. He didn’t ordinarily drink great quantities, but Robert had been rather insistent, and then that odd little woman had started telling fortunes and granting wishes (or so she said) and everyone had gathered around her laughing and drinking even more. Ned had to admit she had been quite entertaining.

He looked beside him in the bed, but Catelyn’s spot was empty. No, his side of the bed was empty. He was alone in the bed, but on Catelyn’s side. Well, she had gone to bed before him. He vaguely recalled her getting irritated at him for trying to undo her braid while they sat there listening to the old woman spout ridiculous prophecies in her thin, reedy voice. She’d said something about the Lord of Winterfell behaving better in his own Hall, and she’d taken his mug of ale away when she’d strode out of the Hall. Robert had quickly handed him another, though.

Robert had thought the whole thing hilarious. “Mayhaps you can grant Ned here some long, red hair like his lady wife’s!” he’d roared at the old woman. “Then he could play with it any time he wanted!”

The men gathered around had laughed, but the old woman had looked directly at Ned with an odd expression on her face. He remembered that now, in spite of his headache. The woman had spoken to him. “Would you truly like to be what you desire most, my lord? It can be done.”

Robert had laughed again. “Hear that? She’s granting Ned wishes! Give him whatever it is he desires and then grant me a long-legged girl with great big teats who wants to make love all night!”

Everyone had laughed except for Ned and the old woman. She’d kept staring at him. He couldn’t remember anything after that. He didn’t even remember coming to Cat’s room or getting into bed.

He sighed, and it sounded oddly high pitched and breathy to him. Likely, Catelyn was still angry with him over his behavior last night. He would have to find her and make some sort of apology. As he turned his head, he saw her bright hair splayed over the pillow, but that could not be. He sat up and jerked his head around quickly. Long auburn locks flew over his shoulder and spilled down over …teats?

He swallowed and raised his hands to touch the teats which had somehow appeared on his chest. They were real, all right. Soft and full just like his wife’s. But the hands that touched them were wrong. They were were soft as well, with long tapered fingers and no calluses to be seen. A sick feeling came over him, and he rose from the bed and walked to his lady wife’s dressing table to look into the glass that hung there.

Catelyn’s face stared back at him, blue eyes wide with shock. Her body was naked save for his own ill-fitting small clothes hanging off her much smaller frame. He shivered, realizing he was cold. He’d never been in cold in this room. Never.

“Oh, I see you’re awake.” He turned around to see himself standing in the doorway, looking at him with narrowed grey eyes.

“I …Cat?”

“Of course it’s me,” she snapped. Only it wasn’t her face or her body or her voice. Ned stared at his own bearded face critically. The face looked stern, disapproving, and full of suppressed wrath. The grey eyes were hard. “Is that what I look like when I’m angry?” he asked.

“Yes,” she spit out. “What were you thinking, Ned, making fun of that woman? You never put any credence in signs or curses or anything beyond your understanding! I tried to warn you!”

“I didn’t . . I wasn’t …it was Robert who went on about getting wishes.”

“And you wished to be me?” That sounded very odd to his ears because the voice was his, but the incredulous tone and inflection of the question were Catelyn’s.

“No! I didn’t wish for anything.”

“Here,” she said then, handing him her robe. “You’re shivering. You must be freezing because I would be, standing there naked like that. I‘ve discovered that I‘m still me, but this body feels things as you would. I haven‘t been cold all morning.” She was still upset, but Ned thought she didn’t sound quite so angry at him now. It was hard to tell. He found emotions more difficult to discern in his own voice than in hers.

“I have to go find that old woman,” he said.

“I already did.”

“Will she help us? Will she undo … .whatever this is?”

Catelyn bit her lip. Well, she bit his lip which looked extremely odd, as it was not a gesture he ordinarily made. “She cannot.” Before Ned could explode, she added quickly, “But she assured me it would reverse itself by morning.”

“Good gods! How are we to behave as each other until then?”

“We can’t,” she said miserably. “Not very well anyway. When I realized what had happened this morning, I had to pretend to be you in order to go out and find the woman. Everyone I met knew something was wrong. I can’t even walk like you convincingly.” She bit her lip again. “But I think it will be all right now.”

“How can this be all right?” he asked miserably.

She came to him and instinctively laid a hand on his chest as she often did to soothe him, only to draw it back when it encountered her own teats rather than the flat, scarred expanse she was used to. “Gods be good,” she muttered under her breath.

Ned found himself distracted at the thought that that rough, callused hand had actually felt good, and he wondered if that were what it felt like for her when he touched her there.

“I’ve told my maids that you …that I …that the Lady Catelyn is ill,” she was saying. “That I have signs of the sickness the Glover men brought into the castle, and so I cannot leave my room and no one should come in until we know for certain. Since I …you, I mean . .whoever I’m being this morning already spent the night here, I told them I’d stay here and care for you and make certain I don’t have it myself. Or yourself. Gods, it’s too complicated to even speak!”

“Then we should be left alone until the morrow, and if the woman spoke truly …”

“We should each be ourselves then.” She lowered her head. “I only hate that the children will be frightened when they hear I am ill and that they are not allowed to come to us.”

He reached beneath her chin, startled at the bristles of the beard and turned it up to look at him. He didn’t have to lift it far as she was taller than he now. “I’m sorry, Cat. I am sorry I allowed this to happen to us.”

She nodded and put her arms around him. Then she actually giggled which sounded extremely odd in his voice. He didn’t think he had ever giggled in his life. “I’m so much bigger than you are now. It seems so strange to be holding …me.”

“Indeed,” he said, but he had not closed the robe she had given him, and he found that the bare flesh in the front of him tingled at the contact of their bodies. He took hold of one of her (his own?) arms and pulled it so that the callused hand brushed across the nipple of his (her?) teat. It stood up almost instantly, and he looked down at it in fascination even as he felt a most delicious tingle. “You like it when I touch you there?” he asked her.

“I do,” she said, and Ned recognized his own voice growing slightly deeper. “I like it when you do this, too,” she said, and she cupped the entire teat with that big hand.

Ned heard himself make a little sound that he’d heard Catelyn make numerous times when he’d touched her, and it startled him but thrilled him in a way as well.

He reached out to take that callused hand. “I think we should go to bed, my love. We are ill, remember?”

He saw the hesitance on his own face as she realized what he was truly suggesting. “I …I don’t know, Ned. I don’t know what to do.”

He’d smiled at her then, thinking that the face he wore was likely indescribably beautiful at that moment because nothing was more lovely than Catelyn’s smiles. “We have until the morrow, my love. We can teach each other.”


	16. Snowed In

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is for the prompt: "Ned/Cat. Snowed in."
> 
> I went Modern AU with this one.

“Is it slowing down at all?”

Ned turned back from the window to look at his wife’s anxious face. “I’m afraid not, my love.”

“We should have left yesterday!” she exclaimed. “We’d be home by now, snowed in with the kids.”

He walked to her. “They’re fine, Cat. You’ve called them six times already.”

“Three,” she said, she said, sticking her tongue out at him. “Rickon called me twice, and Arya called me once.”

He put his hands on her shoulders and tilted his forehead down to touch hers. “And they’re fine. There is plenty of food in the house. Robb and Sansa are fully capable of caring for the rest of them for an extra day. We did leave them in charge for the weekend, and nothing bad has happened, has it?”

“Only this snow,” she said, pouting.

“It’s winter, Cat. It’s New England. It snows.”

“But we weren’t supposed to have a blizzard. I’d never have come if I’d thought …Oh, Ned, I just feel so bad for leaving them. Rickon is really upset that we won’t make it home tonight.”

“Rickon will be perfectly fine, and you know it. Arya’s undoubtedly feeding him junk food and letting him stay up half the night which is all right with me because there is no way they’re having school tomorrow. It’s snowing just as much there as it is here, you know.”

“I know. I just feel guilty about not being there.”

“Well, stop it,” he told her. “Cat, this is the first time I’ve gotten you away for a weekend without the kids since before Bran was born, and I am not going to feel guilty about it and neither are you. Have you had a good time?”

She smiled at him, and he felt his breath catch at the little blush which crept into her cheeks. “Yes. I loved skiing on Friday. And …I loved not skiing yesterday even more.”

The weather had been too dicey to hit the slopes on the second day of their weekend ski trip, but Ned had gone out early and brought all manner of food and several bottles of wine back to their cabin before the roads got too bad. They’d spent the day largely in bed, and he wouldn’t trade it for anything. “Oh, you enjoyed that, did you?” he teased her.

“You know I did.”

“Then stop wishing we’d left early. There’s still wine, you know, and as neither of us is going to be driving anywhere today, we can certainly open another bottle.”

“It’s barely after noon!” she laughed.

“It’s five o’clock somewhere,” he said with a grin, walking to select one of the remaining bottles.

She didn’t protest as he poured a glass for each of them, but he could see she was still distracted. “Come here,” he said, pulling her to the window. “Just look at that,” he said.

Outside the snow fell in huge swirling flakes blanketing everything in white. The tall trees looked like someone had decorated them for a Christmas display, and the ground was an unbroken expanse of white with no way to tell the road from the grass. As they stood there, arms around each other, watching the snow fall, two deer chased each other across the snow into the woods, leaving tracks which were almost immediately obliterated by the falling snow.

Catelyn laid her head against his chest. “It is beautiful,” she said.

“Mmm,” he murmured, enjoying the feel of her against him. After a moment, he bent his head down and reached to turn her face up toward his. “You are beautiful,” he said.”

She smiled. “You still think so? After all these years?”

“You could never be anything but beautiful to me, Cat,” he said, pulling a section of her long auburn hair forward and running his fingers down the length of it. “Surely you know that by now.”

She looked up at him then with a wicked sort of gleam in her eyes. “Show me,” she said.

He didn’t need to be asked twice. After so many years, he’d become quite expert at removing her clothing while kissing her, and he put his expertise to good use as he guided them back toward the bed. When she lay naked before him, he let his eyes roam over every remarkable inch of her before he lay down with her. “You are beautiful,” he whispered hoarsely.

“I love you,” she said, and then he put his lips on hers silencing any words from either of them. He took his time, kissing his way from her earlobes across her neck, along both her beautiful breasts and down her belly to the sensitive place hidden by the small triangle of auburn curls. Every sound she made caused him to want her more, and when neither of them could stand it any longer, he pushed himself into her and they moved together in the manner they both knew so well until both of them cried out as they found sweet release.

Panting, they lay tangled together, and Ned began to laugh.

“What is it?” she asked him, breathlessly.

“Thank God for snow!” he said fervently.

She hit him over the head with the hand that wasn’t trapped beneath him, and he laughed harder.

“Don’t tell me you would rather have been settling an argument over whose turn it is on the xbox than doing what we were just now, my love. Because if you tell me that, you’re a liar, Catelyn Stark.”

Now, she started laughing as well, and he pulled her up to rest her head on his chest. “I do miss the children, Ned,” she said when she’d stopped laughing, “But I don’t think they’ll suffer for one more night without us.”

They lay together in silence for a few moments, and then she flipped over onto her stomach, propping herself up on his chest to look at his face. That wicked gleam was back in those blue eyes again. “In fact,” she said, “It would be a terrible thing for the children if we were to risk ourselves on the roads before they’re safe to travel on. We’ve got plenty of food here …”

“And wine,” Ned interjected.

“And wine,” she laughed. “And the children have plenty of food as well.” She frowned. “Although they’d better stay out of the wine at home.”

Ned laughed at her. “They’re good kids, Cat. You know that.”

“I do,” she agreed. “So …I was thinking …if the snowplows can’t clear the road even by tomorrow …I could call Sansa and let her know where I’ve hidden one of the video games I got for Christmas. Getting one early should keep the younger three well satisfied should we be stuck here even longer than tomorrow …” With that she began kissing his neck and then working her way down his body as he lay on his back.

Ned Stark loved his children very much, but as he watched his wife’s bright hair moving down his chest and felt her lips ghost across his lower belly, he found himself devoutly praying for even more snow.


	17. I Want You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is in response to this prompt: How about Ned/Cat secretly a virgin?
> 
> This one is a modern AU, and it gets a wee bit smutty so I changed the rating of this drabble collection to mature. :)

Catelyn Tully closed her eyes and took a deep breath as she waited for Ned to come back from the kitchen. _You are not a child. You are twenty-three years old, for God’s sake. Get a grip on yourself!_

“I don’t see anymore of that merlot, Cat!” Ned called from the kitchen of her apartment. “There’s a bottle of pinot noir, though, if you’d like that!”

“That’s fine!” she called back. She didn’t really care. She didn’t even want the wine. She’d needed a moment out of his arms, away from his lips, and far from those grey eyes, and she’d seized upon their empty wine glasses as an excuse to send him in search of another bottle. God knew his touch affected her far more than alcohol, and she needed a clear head now. If he thought for one moment that she didn’t truly know her own mind, he’d be out that door before she could stop him.

He appeared in the doorway from the kitchen holding up the bottle of red wine for display. He held it out toward her, bowing deeply. “Will this be acceptable, my lady?” he asked. “Or shall I go out and stomp on some grapes?”

She laughed at him. Two years ago, she’d never have suspected that Eddard Stark ever made a joke in his life, much less made silly, stupid jokes with an endearing grin on that long face of his. None of her friends believed it of him now, in spite of what she told them. Apparently, Ned was capable of silliness only when the two of them were alone together.

“It’s perfectly acceptable,” she said, “But I think you may need a corkscrew.”

He grinned more widely and reached around to his back pocket, pulling out the corkscrew with a flourish, and she laughed harder. “All right then. Come and pour us both a glass.”

“Last one for me, Cat,” he said regretfully as he rejoined her on the couch. “It’s getting late.”

“You’ve only had one glass, Ned,” she teased. “That merlot bottle was barely half full and you gave most of it to me.”

“I still have to drive,” he told her, pouring wine into both of their glasses.

 _Say it,_ she told herself. _Just say it._ “You don’t have to drive. Not if you don’t want to.” She hoped her heart wasn’t beating as loudly as she felt like it was.

“What?” he said, turning his face up from the glasses to look at her with a slightly confused expression.

She bit her lower lip. “I want you to stay, Ned.” She kept her eyes on his as she said it even though she felt like she couldn’t breathe.

“Cat …I …”

“If you want to, I mean,” she said hurriedly. “I …I want to, I do …but …if you don’t …” _God, I sound like an idiot!_

“Catelyn,” he said softly, taking her hands in his. He rarely used her full name except when he was being very serious about something. “Catelyn, you know I want you.” He swallowed and raised one of his hands to run it through the hair that fell forward over her shoulder. “But I would never push you. I want you to be sure.”

“I am,” she said with conviction. Then she leaned forward and kissed him, gently at first, but then putting her hands behind his head to hold him to her and prove exactly how certain she was of what she wanted.

He responded to her kiss with equal passion, wrapping his arms around her, and soon they were as breathless as they had been before he’d gone into the kitchen. “Stay with me,” she whispered against his lips.

He pulled back from her then, and in his grey eyes, she saw the old guilt and doubt. She wished she knew the secret to erasing that forever. “Brandon’s been dead two years,” she said to him, addressing the elephant in the room.

“I know,” he said softly. “You loved him, Cat. I know how much you loved him.”

She felt the tears stinging her eyes then, and she hated that, because she knew he would misinterpret them. “I did love him,” she said. “And when he died, I thought I would die, too. But I didn’t. And you’re the reason I didn’t. You held on to me. You let me mourn. You let me find my way back to myself. So why won’t you let me love you?”

“I never meant …”

“I don’t care what you meant! I love you, Ned. You. Eddard Stark. I am not in love with a ghost. I know perfectly well you are not your brother, and I do not wish you were. I love you.” She looked at him for a long moment during which he simply stared at her intently. No one, including Brandon, had ever made her believe they could see into her very soul quite like Ned could. “Look at me, Ned,” she said softly. “You know I’m telling you the truth.”

“Why?” he asked her suddenly. “Why would love me? After …”

“You didn’t kill him, Ned. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I should have been there. If I’d been there …”

“I shouldn’t have yelled at him when he called me. We can both play that game, Ned, but we need to stop doing it.”

The last night of Brandon Stark’s life had marked both of them, and she knew they would always bear those scars. Brandon’s bachelor party had gotten way out of hand, which wasn’t surprising really, as Brandon had a wild streak and surrounded himself with friends who encouraged it. At some point in the night, well past the hour Brandon had told her the party would be over, an old friend of both Stark brothers, Robert Baratheon, had apparently gone too far with one of the strippers brought in for entertainment, and Ned, likely the only sober person present, had manhandled him into a car and driven him home.

While Ned had been gone, Brandon had drunk dialed her, slurring his words so badly that she’d barely understood him. She’d been furious. Their wedding was a mere twelve hours away at that point, and she’d imagined him puking on her dress at the altar. If he could even stand up. She’d screamed at him, called him terrible names, and hung up on him.

Apparently, he’d gotten in his car to come find her after that. Of course, he’d driven off the road directly into a large tree and been killed instantly. Brandon Stark was dead, and he’d left behind a brother and a fiancee nearly crippled with both grief and guilt. She had dealt with hers by withdrawing from everyone and everything, nearly flunking out of her senior year of college.

Ned had dealt with his by saving her. He’d made her eat. He’d gotten her to classes. He’d even written some of her papers for her. He’d let her cry and scream and hate the world. But he’d never let her go. And he’d never once touched her as anything other than the woman who should have been his sister until six months ago. And he only did then because she pushed the matter. It had taken her eighteen months to realize it, but she finally had. She had not only learned to live again in a world without Brandon, she had fallen deeply in love with Ned.

“I love you, Ned,” she said again now. “And I want you to stay.”

He continued looking at her for a moment and then said, “I love you, too. God forgive me, I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone or anything.”

“Then stay here tonight and love me.”

He pulled her back into his arms then and kissed her. She kissed him back briefly and then stood, taking his hand to lead him to her bedroom. He’d been in her apartment so many times now. He knew her kitchen better than she did herself, as he was the far better cook and loved making her meals. But he’d never even been inside her bedroom.

He was here with her now, though, and before he could change his mind, she pulled her shirt over her head and tossed it onto the floor. When she unclasped her bra and let it fall from her shoulders, he gasped. Determined to go through with this, Catelyn grabbed his hands and put them to her breasts. He hesitated only briefly before moving his hands over them of his own accord and teasing her nipples with his thumbs. Now, she gasped. She had allowed Brandon to do this sort of thing, but no one else had ever touched her there, and the sensation of Ned’s hands on her bare flesh nearly took her breath away.

He continued to kiss and touch her, but he made no move to go any further, and she realized he would wait for her to take the lead. That frightened her just a bit because she didn’t know what to do. Of course, Ned would think she’d made love with Brandon. They’d been together a year and engaged for almost half of that. She known well Brandon had lots of girlfriends before her, and that he’d had sex with most of them. He’d been amused by her insistence that they wait, but while he’d certainly tried to push her boundaries every chance he’d gotten, he’d always stopped when she’d told him to.

If she told Ned that this was her first time, she was terrified that he’d stop, and that was the last thing she wanted. She loved him, and she was finished with waiting. She tugged at his shirt until she got it pushed up to his chest, and then he finally took his hands off her long enough to pull it over his head.

He stopped and looked at her then. “You’re beautiful,” he said, and she felt beautiful when she saw the way his eyes looked at her. She reached to undo her jeans, and he grabbed her hands. “Are you certain?”

“More certain than I’ve ever been of anything,” she breathed. He released his grip on her hands, and she unzipped her jeans, pushing them down over her hips together with her panties in one move before she lost her nerve.

He looked at her as if awed, but then gently set her down on her bed and bent to pull the jeans and the purple cotton panties the rest of the way off her legs. “My God,” he breathed, and she took courage from the fact that he seemed pleased with the sight of her. She’d never been completely naked in front of a man like this before, and she felt somehow awkward in spite of the fact that she wanted him desperately.

She lay back on the bed and looked up at him expectantly. He began to undo his own belt and pants without taking his eyes off her. When he stood there naked before her, she stared at his erect cock. It seemed awfully large to her, and the sight of it filled her with equal parts desire and apprehension. _I love him. I want to do this._

He stretched out beside her on the bed, and she found herself trembling.

“Are you cold?” he asked her.

“A little,” she lied. She felt like she was ready to burst into flames.

He tugged at the comforter and sheet, pulling them down beneath them and then covering them both with the sheet. Ridiculously, that made Catelyn feel less exposed. She was still lying naked beside him wondering what she should do next.

He reached for her then, pulling her close against him and kissing her softly. His hands seemed to touch her everywhere, and the feel of them made her almost dizzy. When his right hand drifted down between her legs, she jumped at the sensation but did not pull away.

Ned certainly didn’t have the history with women that Brandon had, but he had dated girls before, and he at least had more experience than she did. The way he touched her now, moving his fingers and his thumb over every sensitive bit of flesh between her legs, pushing first one and then two fingers inside her in a way that made her wiggle against his hand was proof of that.

She was kissing him and holding him tightly to her, running her hands over his back and the bare flesh of his hips and thighs. She wanted to touch all of him, and she moved one of her hands to the front of him and grasped his cock which felt firm and thick in her fingers. He gasped and bucked a little when she did that, but moved her hand away.

“I’ll never last if you do that, Cat,” he said.

He moved himself down her body then, first kissing her breasts and licking and sucking at both nipples. She’d let Brandon do that, and she’d liked it, but Brandon hadn’t had his fingers moving inside her when he did it the way Ned did now, and Catelyn didn’t think she could stand it. She had never felt anything like this, and while she didn’t want it to stop, she didn’t know if she could stand much more. Then he moved further down, and his mouth was where his fingers had been.

“Oh my God,” she said as her own hips bucked involuntarily. She heard him give a low pitched little laugh and then he grabbed her hips tightly to keep them still while he continued to work with tongue and his lips. After several moments of this, she felt herself coming apart and realized she was actually crying out incoherently.

He raised up to look at her as she lay there panting, and she felt embarrassed by her reaction. The sheet was down at the bottom of the bed now, and both of their naked bodies were fully visible. She wondered if he thought she was some sort of freak, but he was smiling at her. “So you liked that?” he asked almost shyly.

She wasn’t quite certain she could speak so she nodded. He smiled more widely and then he stood up. For a minute, she panicked, thinking he was leaving, but then she realized he was only reaching for his jeans on the floor to retrieve a condom from his wallet. She watched in fascination as he rolled it down over his stiff cock. In spite of what he’d just done to her, she found herself feeling just as desperate for him as she had been when he’d first lain down beside her.

He lay back down now, and she reached for him, pulling him on top of her. He began to kiss her again, and she could feel the tip of his cock teasing her entrance. She reached down and gripped him again, this time to guide him into that opening. He didn’t hesitate once she did that. He pushed himself all the way inside her, and she cried out as she felt a sharp pain.

“Cat?” he asked. “Did I hurt you?”

“No,” she said hurriedly, but he was looking at her face, and he didn’t believe her. “A little,” she admitted. “But it’s all right now.”

“Are you sure? I didn’t mean to hurt you.” He sounded so upset that it broke her heart.

“You didn’t. I’m just …I’m okay now, Ned. Really.” She was, she realized. That sharp stinging sensation was gone, replaced by a fullness that felt very odd, but not necessarily unpleasant. “Please,” she said.

Slowly, he began to move inside her, and at first she felt a slight twinge of pain again, but she remained silent, and he didn’t seem to notice this time. As he continued to move, any pain that might still be there was dwarfed by a far more pleasurable sensation, and even as his thrusts became deeper and faster, she found herself moving into him, wanting to feel all of him. When she felt his body tense in her arms, and then he jerked and cried out, she held him tightly to her, stroking his back as he collapsed on top of her.

“God, Cat,” he said, when he could breathe again. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t wait any longer.”

“Sorry?” she said, puzzled. “Why would you be sorry? I wanted this, Ned.”

“Well, you didn’t …I mean …I didn’t wait for you,” he stammered.

“Oh,” she said, suddenly realizing that he’d wanted her to come when he was inside her. While it had certainly been more pleasurable than painful by the time he finished, she hadn’t come like she had when he’d put his mouth on her. “That’s okay. I already had my turn, remember?”

He kissed her and then rolled to his side, and she felt him slide out of her. “I’ll do it better the next time. I promise.”

She smiled at him, thinking that she was perfectly happy just to know he wanted there to be a next time. He sat up to remove the condom then, and she heard him draw in his breath. He tossed it into the trash basket next to her bed, and then turned to face her. His grey eyes looked far too serious.

“You should have told me,” he said.

“What?” she asked him.

“Catelyn …you were a virgin, weren’t you?”

“Oh,” she said. “That.” There must have been blood on the condom. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Doesn’t matter?” he said, sounding almost angry at her. “It matters to me.”

“Well …it matters to me, too,” she said. “I wanted it to be you. I always want it to be you. But I was afraid if I told you …you wouldn’t.”

He kept looking at her without saying anything else.

“I love you, Ned,” she said quietly. “I’m not sorry, and I don’t want you to be.”

His grey eyes looked warmer at that. “I love you, too,” he said. “I’ve loved you for a long time, and if you’ll have me, I’ll love you from now on.”

“Oh, I’ll have you,” she said, reaching for him.

He came to her then, lying beside her and just holding her in his arms.

“And I meant what I said,” he told her. “I will do it better the next time.”

She laughed. “Well, Ned Stark, they do say practice makes perfect, and I intend for us to get lots of practice.”


	18. Of Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was originally written as a Christmas present for my friend, liebes, who asked for: "How about some sort of Christmas-like Westerosi holiday being celebrated by Ned and Cat?"

Catelyn Stark knelt in the little sept, overwhelmed as she always was on this day with gratitude that she had this place and sorrow that she had no one with whom to share it. Ned had built it for her soon after they came to Winterfell, when everything was so difficult and there was still so much anger, isolation, and uncertainty between them. The anger had long ago abated, and since his return from this last war in the Iron Islands, much of the uncertainty was gone, too. She loved her husband and had finally learned to accept that he loved her as well. Yet, in this place, this gift he had given her, the isolation remained. This place was only hers as the godswood was only his. She could count on her fingers the times he had entered the little seven sided building. She had been to the godswood far more often, of necessity, but she always felt a stranger there.

She rose and walked to the statue of the Maiden, where the ceremony for this day always began. The Feast of Dedication for Family. It had always been her favorite holiday in Riverrun, beginning early in the morning when Father and Mother would take her and Lysa and eventually little Edmure to the sept. The children would remain kneeling in the center while Father and Mother said the words before each of the seven gods. Those early years were the best—-when both Father and Mother had been there to speak. The years after she was eleven when only Father was there to speak and the words referred to Mother’s life and death, were harder. Father had often stumbled over the words he spoke to the Stranger after that.

Still, the day had been mostly happy, even then. No work was done. Once her family finished their little ritual in the sept, other families who lived in the castle came in turn, each one receiving their own private time with the gods to speak the words of prayer and dedication. The children would all laugh and play together, and the men and women would talk and jape and sometimes break into song as everyone awaited their family’s time in the sept. Then gifts were exchanged among family members and finally there was a feast, an enormous celebration which went well into the night.

No one here knew anything about the Feast of Dedication for Family except Septa Mordane. Septa would come to the sept with her if she asked, but she was not truly family. The dear woman did give her a small gift on this day every year, and Catelyn gave her one as well. They both gave small gifts to the children, but Catelyn did not bring them to the sept. Her children were Starks. They would be raised with the gods of their father, although her lord husband had never forbidden her to bring them here.

Sighing she looked up at the face of the Maiden and began the words, her voice sounding small in the empty sept. “Blessed Maiden, look with favor upon this family. I came to Eddard Stark a maiden and gave myself to be his wife. Continue to give to our union your blessing.”

She heard a rustling behind her and turned around to see Robb and little Sansa being ushered into a kneeling position in the center of the sept by her lord husband who then came to stand beside her. Looking up at him with wide, disbelieving eyes, she asked, “What are you …”

He gently put a finger to her lips. “I accepted Catelyn Tully into my home and my bed as a maiden, and made her my wife. I thank the gods for the blessing given to me through her and ask for that blessing to continue now and in the years to come.”

His deep voice resonated into her very soul, and she trembled a little in front of him. She barely noticed that he had changed the words “the Maiden” to “the gods,” and she didn’t care that he had. As she stood there staring at him, he gently took her elbow and guided her to the statue of the Smith. _How does he know to do that?_ she thought.

It was the man’s part to speak first here, and her husband did not hesitate. “I give to my lady wife the labor of my hands, just as I pledged I would when I took her to be mine. May the gods bless all that I have built and will build for the good of my family.”

She swallowed hard. “Before the Smith, I accept the gift of my husband’s labor, and I honor him for all he provides for our welfare. Bless, oh Smith, all the works of our family now and in the years to come.”

She took his hand then and led him to the Mother. They faced each other before the statue, and he took her other hand. She recalled with a start that this is how her parents had stood before the gods on this day—-hands joined, facing each other, and she smiled at Ned as she began the words.

“Blessed Mother, I thank you for the children you have granted me through my husband and for all those children who yet may come. I ask that you keep them strong and healthy, and that you guide my hand as I endeavor to care for them in a manner worthy of you.”

He didn’t hesitate at all over his part here. “Thank you gods, for this woman. For the mother of my children.” His voice was husky as he said that, and Catelyn felt the first tear slip down her cheek. “Protect her as she protects those children. May she continue to bless our children and hold them in her heart just as I bless her and hold her in my heart now and for the years to come.”

She could barely breathe, much less move, as she stood there looking into her husband’s eyes, so it was he who took the lead this time, taking her gently to stand before the Father, and immediately reciting his words.

“Gods, I thank you for the children you have granted me through my wife and for all those children who yet may come. I ask that you keep them strong and healthy, and that you guide my hand as I endeavor to guide them in a manner worthy of you.”

“Thank you, Father, for this man.” Catelyn’s voice broke on the words, and more tears fell down her cheeks. “For the father of my children.” That phrase was barely a whisper, and she took a deep breath before continuing. “Guide him as he guides those children in strength and wisdom. Strengthen him as he blesses our children and holds them in his heart just as I bless him and hold him in my heart now and for the years to come.”

He smiled at her then, and wiped the tears from her face gently with his thumbs before continuing to the Crone. She smiled up at him and held both his hands again as she spoke there. “I ask you for your wisdom, Crone. Light my way in dark places, grant me discernment in times of confusion, and help me act wisely in all things for the good of my husband and children.”

“Grant me wisdom as well, that I might lead this family I have been given through all circumstances with honor and righteousness. I ask this blessing now and for the years to come.”

He took her to the Warrior then, and as he took her hands once more, she thought of the many scars on his body, hidden by his clothing now, but known so well to her fingers. Her husband was certainly a warrior whether he chose to be or not. “Gods give me strength and courage,” he said in his deep voice. “Let no harm come to my wife or family while I have life and strength to protect them. Let me never fear to do what is right or to take up arms in defense of the family you have given me. I swear to you I will lay down my life for their safekeeping.”

The last line chilled her a bit. She wondered if her mother had hated that line as much as she did now. The thought of Ned giving up his life for any reason made her want to clutch him to her and never let him go, but she took another deep breath and spoke her words. “I thank you, Warrior, for the gift of my husband, for his strength and his courage, and his unfailing protection of this family. I ask that you keep him safe. Allow no harm to befall him as he puts himself in harm’s way for our sakes, now and for years to come.” _Please, gods,_ she prayed silently. _Don’t ever allow harm to come to him. Let him remain safe_ _at Winterfell with us now._

They walked together to the statue of the Stranger. Catelyn shivered as she looked into her husband’s eyes now. He gave her slight nod and, hands entwined, they spoke the final words of the ritual together, although he said “gods” when she said “Stranger.”

“Stranger, we ask that you grant us long years upon this earth to see our children grow and flourish. We ask that when at last you come to take our hands, that our lives here will have been well spent and that our family will endure and continue to be blessed, now and for the years to come.”

They stood there silently, just looking at each other until Robb’s voice piped up. “Is that it? Can me and Sansa get up now?”

Catelyn and Ned both laughed. “Yes, sweetling,” she told him. “Come here!”

Robb catapulted himself into her skirts and she put her arms around him while Sansa toddled over to be swept up into Ned’s arms. “I am sorry I did not bring Arya, my lady,” Ned said to her, “But you know how difficult our babe can be to keep quiet, and I didn’t think Robb could keep her still enough.”

“I …you . .no, it’s all right, Ned. She is still too young.” Catelyn stammered over the words, still at a loss to comprehend what had just taken place. “I don’t understand,” she said finally. “Why …how …”

Ned smiled at her. “Robb,” he said. “Take your sister and find Septa Mordane and little Arya. Then all of you go to your mother’s chambers.”

“Presents?” Robb asked enthusiastically. “Is it time to give Mother what we made her? And to get our presents?”

“Yes, son,” Ned laughed. “Go on now, and mind you don’t run so that your sister can keep up.”

Robb huffed a bit as Ned set the little girl down, but he dutifully gave his little sister his hand. “Come on, Sansa,” he said.

“I could run,” the little girl said with more dignity than any three year old had a right to possess, “But I don’t want to get my dress dirty.”

Robb rolled his eyes and led his sister from the sept, leaving Catelyn alone with her husband.

“Presents?” she asked him.

“It is customary on the Feast of Dedication for Family that family members exchange gifts, is it not?” he asked her.

“Well, yes, but …Ned. You don’t keep the Seven. This is nothing that you …”

“You keep the Seven, my lady,” he interrupted her. “I am too often gone and even more often preoccupied by one thing or another even when I am in Winterfell, but I do know when you are sad, Catelyn. I am not so unobservant as that.”

“I am sorry, my lord,” she said. “I didn’t mean to …”

He put his fingers to her lips as he had when he first came into the sept. “Hush, Cat,” he whispered. “You didn’t mean to trouble me, I know. You didn’t mean to impose your gods upon my home. You didn’t mean to insult my people by longing occasionally for the ways of your own. I know all these things, my love. You are Tully to the bone in your adherence to Family, Duty, Honor. I merely wish you to know that your duty to me and my family does not necessitate your giving up everything of yours.”

“I …I know that, my lord. I come to the sept. I am so grateful …”

“I did not build the sept to obtain your gratitude, Cat,” he interrupted, sounding almost irritated with her. “I built it because Winterfell is your home. Your home should reflect all of you, my lady, not only the parts of you which you deem acceptable to the North. Your children should reflect all of you as well. Why is it that our son knew almost nothing of this feast until Septa Mordane taught both of us about it?”

“I …I thought you would prefer your children raised in the ways of your own gods, my lord,” Catelyn said quietly.

“And they are being raised to know my gods. I take them to the godswood and teach them of my faith. That doesn’t mean they should not know all of their mother’s faith as well. They are your children, too, Cat. I would never ask that you keep your gods away from them.”

“I never thought you would forbid it, my lord. I only …”

“You only seek to do what you see as your duty to me in all things,” he sighed. He put his arms around her and pulled her against him. “I am your husband, Cat. You are my wife. The children belong to both of us. I have asked Septa Mordane to begin teaching Robb more formally about your Seven. Sansa is a bit too young for that still, but she loves to sing, and your worship is far more musical than my silent prayers in the godswood. Teach her your songs, my love. I would love to hear you sing them together.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to pretend, Ned,” she said quietly against his chest.

He pushed her back just far enough to look into her eyes. “I have no talent for pretense, my lady. You know that well enough. However, it appears that I have even less talent for communicating to my beautiful wife that what matters to her will always matter to me.” He looked at her a moment, and then continued speaking. “Robb asked me what present I thought you were giving him, and I didn’t know what he was talking about. He explained it was almost the day when Mother gave him and Sansa presents. Now, I knew his birthday was moons away. I also knew you had been rather melancholy lately. He told me that Septa Mordane knew about the present day, so I asked her about it. She told me how the Feast was celebrated in Riverrun, and how much you loved it.”

Catelyn shook her head slowly. “I would never ask you to …”

“No, you wouldn’t,” he interrupted. “And that is my fault. I have not made it clear enough to you that I welcome requests from you—-that pleasing you brings me joy. Septa taught me all the words and I found them quite wonderful. I do not worship your Seven, my lady, but that does not mean I see no value in your faith. Do you honestly doubt that I believe every word I spoke to you in this sept this morning?”

She looked into the honest grey eyes that she loved so much. “No,” she said softly. “You spoke truly and from your heart.” She couldn’t quite let go of her old worries however. “I love that you did you this for me, Ned. I truly do. But you must know that I will never ask you to give your efforts to something that holds no importance to you.”

He ran his fingers along the curve of her cheek and then down through her hair. “I assure you, my lady, that the Feast of Dedication for Family is very important to me. Because it is important to you. And you, Cat, are more important to me than you can possibly imagine.”

He kissed her once more, and this kiss was neither brief nor gentle. Catelyn spared only the tiniest thought that good Septa Mordane would be appalled to see such a kiss taking place in the sept before giving herself up to the boundless pleasure of being in her husband’s arms with his lips against hers. This, after all, was what this Feast Day celebrated. Mayhaps her northern husband had understood that better than she had.

When they finally broke apart, she smiled up at him. “Won’t the children be waiting for us, my lord?”

He grinned down at her. “Yes. Let’s go and celebrate with presents, my lady. Then mayhaps, we can shoo all of them out of your room and celebrate alone for a bit before tonight’s festivities.”

The look he gave her then nearly melted her where she stood, and it took a moment for her to realize all that he had said. “Tonight’s festivities?”

“A large celebratory feast is the customary ending to this day, is it not?”

“Well, yes …but how did you? I mean, surely I would know if a feast were being planned in Winterfell!”

He laughed at her. “Not if I made it abundantly clear to everyone in the castle that this particular feast was a surprise for the Lady of Winterfell. Our people care for you a great deal, Cat. I’ve never seen such enthusiasm for any event held here before.”

“Oh, Ned!” She threw her arms around him and kissed him once more.

“So I take it you are pleased, then?” he asked her once they broke apart once more for breath.

“I am pleased,” she told him. “And I am blessed. And I meant every word I said earlier as well, Ned. I thank your gods and mine that I am your wife.”

The expression of joy and tenderness on his face then was something to treasure. He ran his hands gently through her hair once more and softly kissed her forehead. “I am glad of that,” he told her. “And I am glad that Septa Mordane told me of this Feast Day. It is a good thing to celebrate, Cat, and we will do so every year in Winterfell from now on.”

He held out his arm to her. “And now, my lady, our children await us.”

She smiled as she took his arm, her heart full almost to the point of bursting. _No one has ever been more blessed,_ she thought as they stepped together into the bright morning light of the courtyard. _Whatever the years to come may bring to us, I will always know that no other woman has found more love than I have in this place with this man._

Catelyn Stark leaned into her husband as they walked together toward the Great Keep and their children. She knew the memory of those Feast Days in Riverrun would always be dear to her, but she knew just as surely that today was the most wonderful Feast of Dedication for Family that she had ever known. She began softly humming one of the old familiar songs of the day under her breath as she looked forward to the celebrations in Winterfell for years to come.


	19. Home is Where the Heart Is

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Modern AU written for a GameofShips Hump Day prompt.
> 
> Ned Stark comes home from a business trip and is initially rather disappointed in his welcome.

Ned Stark opened the front door of his house and set his bag down in the floor of the entryway. Immediately, the left side of his head was hit by some sort of flying object, and he looked down to see a brightly colored foam projectile lying on the floor beside him.

“Rickon!” he shouted.

“Oh, sorry, Dad!” came Bran’s voice rather than Rickon’s, and Ned looked up to see his second son standing on the second floor landing with a Nerf gun in his hand and a sheepish expression on his face. “I didn’t realize you were there. I was shooting at . . .”

He was interrupted by a loud howl as the youngest Stark emerged from the doorway to Ned’s left firing a barrage of foam darts up at his brother from what appeared to be the Nerf version of an AK-47. The little boy stopped firing and yelling only after he slammed into Ned.

“Dad,” he said, looking surprised to see Ned there. “You’re home.”

“I’m home,” Ned sighed, bending to pick up the dart Bran had fired. “And you two are not to shoot these things in the house except in the basement. How many times have your mother and I told you . . .”

“The basement’s all wet,” Rickon interrupted, moving around Ned to walk toward the kitchen. “Mom!” he shouted then at the top of his lungs. “Dad’s home!”

“All wet?” Ned started to ask, looking back up toward Bran, but Sansa had appeared on the landing beside him, apparently alerted to her father’s presence by Rickon’s shout.

“Daddy!” she cried with obvious joy, and Ned felt a bit warmed at the thought that one of his children at least seemed to have missed him.

She rushed down the stairs to hug him and plant a kiss on his cheek, and Ned realized she was wearing her cheer uniform and a coat. “Daddy, can Robb and I take your car? It’s bigger than Mom’s and we’ve got to pick up Theon and Jon and Jeyne, and . . .”

 _Ah,_ Ned thought, somewhat disappointed. _It’s the car she missed._

“Yes, you can . . .but . . .”

“Come on, Robb! We’re going to be late!” Sansa hollered back up the steps.

“Is there a game tonight?” Ned asked in some confusion. Catelyn had known he was coming home this evening, and she hadn’t said anything about it. As much as he loved watching Robb play basketball and Sansa cheer, the idea of leaving the house as soon as he’d arrived didn’t appeal to him.

“No,” Sansa said. “A pep rally and bonfire. We play Kings Landing in the regional finals tomorrow and it’s a lot bigger school, so they’ve had us doing all this spirit stuff all week. Robb!” she yelled again.

“Keep your shirt on!” came Robb’s voice, and Ned saw his first born appear from his bedroom. About halfway down the stairs, he appeared to realize that his father was standing in the entryway beside his sister. “Dad! When did you get here?”

“Just now.” Ned looked at his son. Apparently the team didn’t have to attend this event in uniform because Robb had on blue jeans and a Direwolves Basketball sweatshirt with his name and number on the back. Ned knew the shirt as well its price very well because someone at the school found it necessary to have the boys on the team buy brand new, slightly different Direwolves apparel every year in spite of the fact that neither Robb’s name nor number ever changed.

“Great,” Robb said. “Can we take . . .”

“The car. Yes. Sansa already asked. Keys are in it. Drive carefully, son.”

“Always,” Robb said with a grin. “Oh,” he said, turning back as Sansa opened the door and the winter air blew into the entryway. “How was your trip?”

“Good enough, but I’m glad to be home,” Ned responded, smiling at his son. He knew Robb hadn’t the slightest interest in what he did on his business trip, but he appreciated the boy’s effort. “Go on now, son, before your sister starts honking the horn.”

Robb laughed and followed his sister outside.

Ned looked back up to see that Bran had disappeared, and he sighed. “Cat?” he called.

“In the laundry room!” She sounded aggravated, and Ned started down the hall in the direction of the laundry room with some trepidation.

“I think it’s stopping!!” His younger daughter’s shout as she ran up the basement stairs was the only thing that caused Ned to jump quickly away from the door at the top of them, saving him from being knocked out by said door when Arya pushed it open even more forcefully than usual.

“Dad!” she said, when she saw him standing there. “Mom! Dad’s home!” she shouted. Ned noted that Arya was barefoot, and her sweatpants were pushed up to just below her knees.

“What’s going . . .”

“Mom!” Arya yelled again.

“I heard you the first time.”

Ned looked up to see his wife standing at the end of the hall, wearing jeans and an old grey shirt, with her hair pulled back in a rather messy ponytail. She had a smudge of dirt across her face, and she looked unhappy. To Ned, who hadn’t seen her in nearly a week, she also looked absolutely gorgeous.

“No more water is coming through?” Catelyn asked Arya now.

The girl shook her head. “I don’t think so. It’s still a wet mess down there, though.”

Catelyn sighed. “Go get cleaned up for dinner, Arya. And send Bran down. Rickon’s already down here in the family room.”

“Yes, Mother,” she said. “I bet Dad can fix it,” she added, giving Ned a perfunctory hug before running up the stairs.

“Fix what?” he asked Catelyn.

“The washing machine. Or the pipe. Or whatever it is that broke.” She shook her head. “Welcome home, Ned,” she said with just a hint of an ironic smile.

Even the small smile drove all thoughts of the washing machine from his mind, and he reached to embrace her.

She moved away from him, though. “I’m filthy!” she said, “And you’re in one of your good suits! Why on earth did you wear that for the plane?”

“I didn’t have time to change after our last meeting. I don’t care if you’re filthy, Cat.”

“That’s nice to hear,” she said, smiling at him more broadly. “But I’m the one that’ll have to take that suit to the cleaners. I promise to welcome you properly once I’ve changed.”

They were interrupted by the piercing sound of the smoke alarm.

“Oh, damn! The dinner rolls!” Catelyn turned and fled into the kitchen like a shot. By the time, Ned caught up with her, she was already dumping a tray of blackened smoking rolls into the sink. She then stood there, gripping the counter with her eyes closed as if praying for strength as the alarm continued to sound for another two or three minutes.

Ned went to slip his arms around her waist, but she whirled on him. “Did I not just ask you not to get that suit dirty?” she snapped.

“Sorry,” he said, holding up his hands and backing off, a little bit irritated with her now.

The flash of anger in her blue eyes was gone as quickly as it had appeared, and she bit her her lip. “No, I’m sorry, Ned. It isn’t your fault. It’s just that . . .” She shook her head. “Let me get dinner on the table before I burn up the rest of it. I’m afraid the flood had rather poor timing.”

“The flood . . .” he said as Catelyn moved back toward the stove and began moving pots and pans around.

“Yes, the flood. Yell at the kids to set the table, would you please. Just five of us. Robb and Sansa have a pep rally and they’re eating out with friends.”

“ They’re already gone. I saw them. The flood . . .” he repeated.

She sighed. “Arya was doing laundry. I don’t think she did anything wrong. She’s used the washer before. But the boys went down to the basement to play and started screaming that water was all over the floor and coming through the ceiling. To make a long story short, I discovered the water was coming from the laundry room. Somehow the washer sprung a leak somewhere and the water in the laundry room floor got into a vent and poured down into the basement. Even after I turned everything off, it took me forever to get enough of the water out of the laundry room to stop the indoor rain. And I’d already started dinner and . . .” She sighed again. “I’ll get you all fed, and then I’ll start on the basement.”

“It’s all right, Cat. That washing machine is getting old, isn’t it?”

She raised one brow at him. “Your father gave it to us as a wedding gift.”

“Oh, god!” he laughed. “It’s ancient, then!” Making a big show of keeping his suit far away from her, he leaned in to plant a brief kiss on her lips. “I’ll get the kids down here, and I’ll go and mop up the basement.”

“But you have to eat!”

“I’ll eat when I’ve finished. I can wait for food, unlike the younger members of the household.”

“But . . .”

“No arguments, Cat. I’ll change out of the suit.”

She laughed then. “Go on then. I’ll wait and eat with you.”

Ned was tired. He’d gotten up at five that morning, and the last meeting with the ever contentious Lannisters the night before had gone nearly until midnight. He’d envisioned a far more relaxing homecoming, but he couldn’t ask any more of Cat. He picked up his bag to carry up the stairs, told Arya and Bran to get a move on, and carefully hung up his suit as he removed it lest he face his wife’s wrath. He grabbed his oldest pair of jeans (the ones Catelyn made fun of--“They’re more holes than denim at this point, Ned!”) and an equally ancient sweatshirt and prepared to do battle with the basement flood.

After about an hour, Catelyn appeared at the top of the stairs. “I’m running Arya over to the Mormont’s,” she told him. “She’s spending the night. When I get back, the two of us can eat.”

“Sounds good,” Ned told her. “I’m almost finished down here.”

“I’ve had the kids working on the laundry room with me,” she said. “I think everything’s in good enough shape to stop for the evening.”

He nodded. “Come here,” he said.

She looked at him quizzically.

“I’m as filthy as you are now,” he told her.

She laughed and came the rest of the way down the stairs, all but falling into his arms. As tired as he was, the feel of her in his arms sent a jolt of warmth and energy through him, and he put his lips to hers. She responded quite readily, her hands going to the back of his head as she pressed herself more tightly against him. He had one hand on her waist and he dropped the other to cup the curve her bottom through her jeans.

“Mom! Are you coming?” Arya’s voice came from the top of the stairs, followed by. “Ew. Can’t you wait until I’m out of the house at least?"

Ned looked up at his younger daughter without moving away from his wife. “Can’t you be a bit more respectful, young lady?" he asked her.

She huffed a little, but then smiled. “Sorry,” she said. “But, Mom. Lya’s waiting on me.”

Catelyn slipped from his arms. “Hold that thought,” she said, patting him on the rear end with a wicked grin before going up the stairs to join their daughter.

“Really, Mom?” Arya said rolling her eyes, but Ned could see the girl was smiling. “You two really can be kind of sickening sometimes,” he heard her tell Cat as they left the basement together.

Within another ten minutes, Ned decided the basement was as dry as it was going to get tonight. He took off his wet gym shoes and wearily trudged up the stairs to take a shower. He called out to Bran and Rickon, but they didn’t answer, and he guessed that they likely had on their xbox headphones. He pulled off the sweatshirt as he entered his bedroom and sat down on the bed to remove his socks. The bed felt awfully good, and he leaned back, intending only to lie there a moment.

He woke to the sound of soft feminine laughter and a sudden weight on his pelvis. Opening his eyes, he saw his wife’s face above him looking down with an amused smile, and he realized she had seated herself on the bed straddling him.

“Hello, Sleepyhead,” she said with a smile.

“I didn’t mean to fall asleep,” he mumbled.

“I’m guessing you went to bed too late and got up too early,” she said with a slight frown.

“Good guess.”

“And then you come home to disaster and hard manual labor. Poor boy.”

He chuckled softly. “Only a minor disaster. But as Arya has an inflated opinion about my skills at appliance repair, you’ll get a new washing machine out of the deal.”

 _“I’ll_ get a new washing machine? I was under the impression that seven people depended upon that washing machine in order to have clean clothes. Will the new one be only for my clothes?”

“Point taken,” he said gruffly. “You know what I meant, though.”

“I do,” she said softly. She bit her lip as if uncertain if she should say more. “You work very hard, Ned. I know that. But this house and all that goes on inside it isn’t just mine. You, me, the kids. We’re all in this together. I need you to remember that.”

He sighed and put a hand to his forehead. “They barely noticed I was home, Cat,” he said to her, realizing he sounded petulant.

She laid her hands on his bare chest. “They noticed. They notice even more when you go.” She bit her lip again. “But, Ned, you’ve been gone a lot lately. The trips are getting longer and more frequent . . .”

“Robert says that . . “

“I know,” she said, leaning forward to silence him with a kiss. “Robert can’t do without you. I’ve heard him say it myself often enough. I know he puts a lot of pressure on you to do more and more, Ned. But when you are gone so much, the kids and I can’t simply put our lives on hold. I have a job. They have school. We all have friends and gatherings and a million things that go on whether you’re here or not. They don’t like living their lives in your absence anymore than I do, my love, but they will keep living their lives. They are as happy to see you as I am when you return, but that doesn’t mean they’ll interrupt those lives for it. Pep rallies and overnights and washing machine disasters take place without any consideration of your arrival times, I’m afraid.”

“Living their lives in my absence,” he muttered. “Is that what you feel like your doing?”

She looked down at him. “Truthfully? Sometimes.” She smiled at him. “But you’re right here now.” She reached up and pulled the brightly colored elastic thing from her ponytail, shaking her head to allow the brilliant auburn tresses to fall down softly over her shoulders.

He reached up to let his fingers run through that hair. “I have responsibilities,” he said. “This last promotion . . .I’ve been given so much control over so many aspects of the business, and I . . .”

“I know,” she said, putting a finger to his lips. “Robert puts enough pressure on you, Ned. I have no wish to add to it. Truly, I don‘t.”

He wondered what she wasn’t saying. He’d been perfectly content working in his own family’s business when Robert had come to him three years ago, practically begging for him to come to Baratheon Enterprises. They’d been friends forever, and Ned knew his father intended Brandon to take over his family’s company eventually rather than himself, so Ned had agreed to make the move. And Catelyn had supported his decision.

Then again, Catelyn always supported his decisions. He couldn’t recall a single instance where she’d put her foot down and insisted he not do something he truly had his heart set on. She’d not even gone too crazy when he’d come home with Siberian Husky puppies for all five children.

Robert had certainly made the move worth his while financially. While he and Catelyn both tended to be frugal by nature, they could certainly afford a new washing machine or anything else they needed, and Ned was a bit ashamed that it had taken a flood to cause him to think about some of the aging appliances in the house. Financially, they were far better off than they’d ever been.

The traveling, though. Robert had already told him he wanted him at the Chicago office on Tuesday. That was only four days from now, and Robert wasn’t sure how long he’d need to stay. Ned realized that he didn’t want to go.

His thoughts were distracted by a movement above him and he realized Catelyn was pulling off her shirt. He watched as she discarded it beside her on the bed, noticing that beneath the old shirt, she wore his favorite black, lace bra.

“What are you doing, Cat?”

“Trying to get your attention,” she said. “Not very successfully, I’m afraid. You’re a million miles away, Ned.”

“No,” he said softly, reaching up to cup the breasts displayed so enticingly in the black lace. “I’m a million miles away too damn often, but to quote my beautiful wife, I’m right here now.”

She smiled at him and leaned down once more. This kiss was deeper than the others, and his own lips opened to her hers. His hands moved behind her, both to pull her down against him and to find the clasp of her bra. He liked it, all right, but he liked her better out of it.

She laughed when she felt the clasp spring free and she raised up enough to allow the bra to slip down over her arms. Immediately, he pulled her back toward him, this time to put his mouth first on one pink nipple and then the other, his cock growing firmer with each sound she made in response. His cock also responded to the movements of her hips as she rocked herself in a circular motion against him. With both of them now shirtless, but still in blue jeans, he was reminded almost comically of the old days of teenaged dry humping in cars and on sofas.

They hadn’t needed to settle for that in years though, and he reluctantly took his tongue away from her breasts, pulling back enough to find the zipper of her jeans. Out of the corner of his eye, he realized the bedroom door was opened, and he stopped.

“The boys,” he whispered urgently. They’d been interrupted a few times in fairly compromising positions by one child or another over the years, and he had no desire to repeat the experience if he could help it.

“Are gone,” she whispered back, leaning in to bite his ear lobe and then trail her lips down over his neck and chest, making him shiver.

“Gone,” he repeated, trying to make his brain comprehend English as her tongue now flicked at his nipples.

“Mmhm,” she said, sitting up with a smile. She then raised herself off him to stand at the side of the bed, and he started to protest until he realized she’d stood to slide her jeans down. She wasn’t wearing any panties.

“Oh, God,” he said, reaching up for her.

She pushed him back down laughing. “The boys,” she said, standing above him, gloriously naked, “are at your brother’s. They always love staying with Ben, and he lives over by the Mormont’s, so once Arya had her plans, I called him today to see if he’d take them. Robb and Sansa are allowed to stay out until midnight.”

“You planned this,” he accused her.

“Mmhm,” she said again. “Well, not the part with the washing machine,” she laughed as she kneeled down on the floor and began undoing his jeans.

He reached his own hands down to help her, and in a matter of seconds, the jeans were on the floor and his beautiful wife had her mouth on him.

“Oh my god, Cat!” he groaned, twisting his fingers in her hair.

In a very short time, he felt he couldn’t last one more minute, and he pulled her up urgently. Smiling, she straddled him as she had before, but there was nothing between them this time. She was as ready as he was, and as she guided him inside her, he reached a hand down between them to stroke her as she moved herself up and down on him.

His hips jerked up to meet her movements as if of their own accord, and his breaths came shorter as he watched her beautiful face respond to what he was doing to her with his fingers. He reached up with the other hand to grasp one of the breasts which hung there before him as she moved. Holding himself back was almost painful, but he waited until he felt her tense, heard her cry out, and saw the release on her face before he let himself go. Then he grabbed onto both of her hips, thrusting himself up into her as deeply as he could, and allowed his own release to overtake him.

She fell down on top of him, and they both lay there gasping for breath for some time. Her weight on him and the softness of her hair spread over his chest felt inexpressibly sweet.

“I missed you,” she finally whispered.

He realized then what she hadn’t said before. She’d told him honestly enough what life was like for her and the children in his absence. She’d reminded him that this home belonged to both of them. She’d confirmed for maybe the millionth time in their nineteen year marriage that she would always support him. Always be here. Always be waiting for him.

But only now did he hear in her whisper the depth of her need for him. He understood it because he shared it. When he was away from her, he longed for her the way starving men craved food or drowning men craved oxygen. He needed her more than he’d ever thought it possible to need another person before they had wed, and the years had only increased that need rather than lessened it. God, he loved her.

He didn’t know how to put any of that into words, though.

“I missed you, too,” he said.

She smiled and kissed him once more, sweetly and softly, before rolling off him and readjusting her position on the bed, as they’d still been lying across it sideways with his feet on the floor. He moved with her, pulling his legs up onto the bed and pulling her back against him, wanting to keep her wrapped in his arms.

“Robb has a game tomorrow,” she said.

“Mmm,” replied. “King’s Landing. Regional finals.”

She raised her eyebrows, impressed at his knowledge.

“Sansa told me,” he admitted. “I think we should pick up Arya and the boys early enough for all of us to go and watch him play. And watch Sansa cheer.”

“They’d like that,” she said with a smile. “I’d like that.”

“What time is the game?” he asked, realizing he didn’t know.

“Three o’clock,” she said.

“Perfect. Then we can all go out for an early family dinner celebration that doesn’t involve your having to cook, and we’ll be finished in time for all of our very social offspring to easily make whatever Saturday night plans they inevitably have.”

“Perfect,” she agreed. She twisted around to kiss him again. “I love you, Ned.”

“I love you, too, Cat. You do know that, don’t you?”

She smiled at him and curled herself against him. “I know that,” she assured him. “The kids know it, too, Ned,” she added softly.

She somehow always knew what he needed to hear. He wondered if it were even possible for her to truly know what she meant to him. He didn’t have the words for it. “You’re everything to me, Cat,” he whispered hoarsely. “You and the kids. You’re everything.”

She had tears in her eyes when she kissed him then, and Ned Stark decided he was not going to Chicago on Tuesday. On Monday, he was going to have a long talk with Robert Baratheon about significantly reducing his traveling. Right now, though, he wasn’t giving Robert or anyone or anything else another thought as he returned his wife’s kiss.


	20. To Give My Lord My Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is actually a sequel to "To Hold My Lady's Heart" which is Chapter 13 in this collection. This was written for mindlessconundrum (aka metal-and-dust) in response to her prompt on tumblr and takes place immediately following the events of my earlier story.

Catelyn Stark felt positively decadent as she pulled her dress back on over her naked body with no shift beneath it, but her shift remained far too damp to wear, and Ned was adamant that they must be on their way back to Castle Cerwyn as quickly as possible. In truth, she was anxious to be away now as well. Her breasts had grown quite heavy, reminding her painfully of her infant daughter. This was the longest she had ever left one of her babies, and she bit her lip as she wondered how her child was faring in her absence.

“Arya is fine, my lady.”

With her head and arms now completely through the right spots in the dress, she looked up to see her husband watching her with some amusement. It sometimes bothered her that she was so transparent to him. He certainly wasn’t to her, although she had gotten far better at deciphering his subtle changes in expression over the years. “I simply don’t want her to be hungry,” Catelyn said softly. “She takes from me far more easily than she does a nurse.”

“And you prefer it that way,” Ned said with a smile, coming behind her to help with her laces. He was clad only in his breeches, having not yet reached for his shirt or doublet. “You will provide all our young pup requires upon our return, Cat,” he said, reaching around to cup one of her breasts as he pressed his lips briefly to the back of her neck.

She found herself blushing at the memory of what they had been doing right here in the open only a few moments before, but also leaning back into him as the stirrings of desire began to wake once more. His other hand came around her waist then, pulling her hips against the front of him, and it became obvious she was not the only one who felt the pull between them yet again.

“Gods be good,” he groaned, releasing her and forcefully turning away. “I fear we’ll never get back if I keep touching you, my lady.”

She turned to look at him, and her breath caught in her throat at the sight of him bare chested there in the sun. He was remarkably well made, and had returned from the Iron Islands even leaner than before after long days of camp rations, with his muscles hardened by battle. Her eyes dipped lower, and she could see his cock beginning to stand out against his breeches. Quickly, she looked away. They needed to return to Castle Cerwyn.

“You said there is food in your saddlebags, my lord?” she asked, her voice hitching only slightly.

“Aye,” he growled, and she heard him fumbling for his shirt.

She busied herself finding what he had brought for them, and when she turned to look toward him once more, he was fully dressed and spreading the blanket more neatly upon the ground. When she carried the food over to sit beside him there, it was plain enough that his thoughts, like hers, kept returning to what they had been doing on that blanket so recently.

“Here, my lord,” she said, breaking off a large chunk of bread to hand him. If they were both chewing, they would feel less compelled to make conversation and be less awkward in their silence.

It wasn’t as if her lord husband had any doubts that she welcomed his lovemaking any more than she doubted he desired her. Neither of them pretended that coupling was a simply a matter of marital duty or childbearing any more. They were both too honest for that. She simply wasn’t certain what it meant, if anything, when they were not in her bed. _Or lying naked on a_ _riverbank,_ she thought, feeling the heat creep into her cheeks.

She was shocked at her own wantonness. She had practically told her lord husband to strip naked and take her in the middle of the day outdoors in a place she had never been before. The thrill of swimming in a river again followed by the heat of his body against hers had apparently caused her to take leave of her senses. Not that she regretted it. She didn’t, and she was fairly certain he didn’t either. But even though he had taken to staying with her most nights in her chamber, it was far easier to whisper a few words and then fall asleep in the dark curled up against him after giving him her body than it was to sit across from him in the sunshine and make conversation.

He had brought a bottle of very good wine—one of her favorites—and she wondered if Lord Cerwyn approved of his taking such a fine vintage for an impromptu outing. Not that it mattered. The man would hardly deny his liege lord something he asked for. But Ned did not impose upon his bannermen the way she had known some lords to do. He did not demand lavish feasts or their finest accommodations, always content to accept what was offered with courtesy. So she knew he had requested this for her and found herself oddly touched by it.

He noticed her studying her glass, now empty, and he smiled. “Would you care for some more, my lady? We can spare a few moments, and I know you like it.”

“Yes. Thank you, my lord,” she said, returning the smile. He seemed to smile more frequently when only the two of them were present, and that pleased her more than she cared to admit to herself.

He emptied the bottle into their glasses and looked out at the river. “I had forgotten the sound,” he said. “I recall how it struck me that it was never truly silent at Riverrun. Even at night, when no one stirred, the river sang its song.”

“I never forget it,” she said softly. “Even as long as I’ve been in Winterfell, I sometimes wake at night and am surprised by the silence because I think to hear the waters.”

“I don’t want you to be unhappy, Cat.”

She’d followed his gaze to the White Knife, but she turned toward him then to find his grey eyes fixed upon her, his expression solemn and almost anxious.

“I am not,” she assured him. “You have made me more welcome than I ever thought to be in Winterfell, my lord. It is my children’s home, and it has become mine as well.” She bit her lip then, not knowing precisely how to express the next bit, but she pushed forward. “And …while you were away, my lord …the people in the castle treated me with the same respect as when you are here. They saw me as Lady Stark.”

“And you doubted they saw you as such until I left to fight Robert’s new war?” he asked, raising his brow.

“I am a stranger here,” she said. “Different clothes, different customs …even different gods. I was not certain how they would feel when you left me to rule in your stead.”

“You were a stranger,” he said, “When first you came to Winterfell. Now, you are simply their lady. Just as you are mine.” He looked at her a moment with that intense gaze of his and then turned up his own glass, draining the liquid from it. “Finish your wine at your leisure, Cat, and I shall make us ready to go.”

She watched him as he got to his feet and began to gather things up to go back into the saddlebags. She had never seen a man wait upon a lady the way he sometimes did for her. It used to bother her, making her wonder if he found her own attention to such things lacking in some way, but she had eventually accepted it as the kindness it was.

She had not always been predisposed to see kindness in this solemn Northman who’d greeted her when she’d arrived at his castle with his trueborn son and heir by showing her the bastard he’d gotten on some woman he refused to name. As he had made it abundantly clear that Jon Snow was to be raised in Winterfell alongside Robb however she felt about it, she’d hardened her heart against her husband and this bastard he seemed to love at times more than his own trueborn heir. She’d vowed to do her duty by him, but no more.

She hadn’t been able to keep that vow, though. She’d lived with the man, eaten with him, watched him with their son, and shared her bed with him. And whatever her feelings about the bastard, she could not come to know Eddard Stark well without knowing that her husband was truly a good man, and in all respects save the one, likely the most honorable man she had ever known.

They had come far since those terrible early days, and she realized she should likely stop being surprised by such kindnesses as this bottle of her favorite wine or the journey to the river itself. He’d been doing such things for her since before Sansa was born—from such small things as making certain the cooks at Winterfell learned to prepare dishes she liked to the enormous gift of the sept which he had built for her not long after her arrival.

She had once been able to tell herself that these were the acts of an honorable man out of respect for the woman he’d wed for honor’s sake and for the sake of an army, but she knew well enough now that he truly desired to please her in these things. He pleased her a great deal. She acknowledged that she felt warm and that her heart sped up when he asked her for her thoughts on something or he laughed at a story she told or he looked at her with pride in his eyes. This warmth was a deeper thing than only the heat which he so easily coaxed within her flesh, but she refused to name it for fear it was something he could never quite return.

 _Jon Snow,_ she would remind herself any time she began to feel too safe with this man, too free with her affection, too generous with her trust. Had he shown the same kindness and tenderness to the boy’s mother? Did he think of her still? While she wasn’t terribly bothered that another woman had shared Ned’s bed while he had been away from her during that first year, she was bothered more than she cared to admit that he might still think of her. And she was pleased more than she should be simply for duty’s sake that it seemed her husband bedded no women other than herself now.

“Are you ready, my lady?”

She looked up from her musings to find him looking down at her with a concerned expression on his face.

“Yes,” she said. “Let’s ride to our daughter, my lord.”

He gave her his hand to help her rise and then lifted her easily onto her horse. She could mount by herself, of course, and he knew it, but he always liked to help her, and she enjoyed letting him. As they began the ride back to Castle Cerwyn, he was very quiet. Silence was hardly unusual for him, but she began to fear that he was more upset by her behavior than he had let on.

“I hope I did not anger you, my lord,” she said finally. It was easier to speak as they rode because the need to guide the horse gave her an excuse not to look too long into that penetrating gaze of his.

“Anger me? Whatever would I be angry about?” He stopped his horse and reached out his hand to her, forcing her to stop her horse as well. “I have enjoyed this day very much. More than I have enjoyed any day for a very long time. But now I fear that I have done something to upset you. Please tell me what troubles you, my lady.”

He looked so sincere as he asked her to speak that she found herself responding. “I dove into the river. I heard you forbid me, my lord, and I did it anyway. That was wrong of me, and I should not have done it.” She looked down as she finished speaking, unable to look up at him. She could only recall him using the word ‘forbid’ with her one other time, and that was the one night of their marriage she refused ever to think on. He had been so angry with her then, and now she realized that she was honestly afraid his use of the word today meant that he was angry with her now, in spite of the tenderness they had shared this afternoon.

“Damnation,” he swore under his breath, and she looked back up at him. He was looking away from her now, but he turned back toward her before he spoke again. “I wasn’t angry, Cat,” he said softly. “I was terrified. I told you I was afraid to lose you. That is the truth, my lady.”

 _I thought I’d lost you._ He had said that as she’d lain in his arms shaking from the cold of the river.

“You won’t lose me, Ned,” she said firmly, repeating her words from earlier, realizing that she couldn’t bear the thought of losing him, either. She’d been terrified the entire time he’d been gone to fight the Greyjoys. She’d told herself that she feared for him as her lord husband, as the father of her children, as her protector and provider in this northern wilderness she’d come to call home. But she had honestly simply feared the loss of him. Of Ned himself. Of his voice and his precious, rare smiles, and the feel of his arms around her. “You will not lose me,” she said again, and she kicked her horse into motion once more.

“I am glad to hear it,” he said, riding up beside her. “We will go to Riverrun, Cat,” he said. “We should be able to travel within the year, if Lord Hoster is willing to have us.”

“Willing?” she exclaimed. “He would welcome us whenever we came! You know that!” She bit her lip again. “But, Ned, are you certain?”

He smiled at her. “Well, if today is any indication of the summer ahead of us, the weather will likely be no impediment. Young Arya has proven herself an agreeable enough traveler, and within a few more moons, she’ll be sturdy enough for a long journey. Robb will be beside himself with excitement at the prospect, and when has Sansa ever been the least bit difficult about anything? We shall do fine, my lady.”

“But you’ve not been home very long. If we both leave Winterfell …”

“We shan’t be leaving until I know all is well in the North. And we won’t be able to stay as long as you would like. At least I won’t, although the you and the children could stay longer if you wished. But the North can spare the both of us for a short while, my lady. And I would very much like to watch you swim again.”

She blushed then, recalling his eyes upon her as she stretched out naked on the blanket.

“You looked exactly like Sansa, you know.”

That shocked her, and it must have shown on her face because he at first looked concerned, and then laughed at loud. “I meant while you were in the river, my lady. With the water up to your neck. The way you smiled at me then—you looked precisely like our daughter does when she has discovered perfect happiness. It takes so little with her—a pretty ribbon or a lemoncake. I would have that smile on her face all the time.” He swallowed then. “I would have it on your face as well, Cat. You are beautiful always, but you are incomparable when you smile like that.”

Her breath caught then. He so rarely said such things. He was looking at her as if she truly were incomparable, as if he valued her above all things, and her heart skipped several beats. She stopped her horse then, not wanting to have to look back toward the trail ahead of them. She wanted to keep his eyes on her. He stopped his horse as well. “You made me smile today, Ned,” she told him. “You gave me …this gift. This day.” _Yourself,_ she thought. _You have given me yourself. Whatever of yourself you have_ _to give, you would offer it to me._ “I thank you, my lord.”

He reached out again and caught her hair in his fingers. She’d left it loose to finish drying in the sun as they rode. “I told you I would do much to make you happy, Cat. And I will gladly spend more days learning just how to do that.”

She reached up and grabbed his hand, holding it against her cheek. “I would make you happy, too, my lord.”

“You already do.” He smiled at her. “We should not tarry any longer, though, my lady. I fear that if we continue to stop, I am going to give into my very strong desire to take you off that horse and remove that dress once more.”

“I don’t think I would object,” she whispered.

He pulled his hand from hers. “Perhaps not, my lady,” he said with a hint of laughter in his voice in spite of the roughness of his breathing. “But you would undoubtedly become angry at me afterward when I inform you that we could no longer make Castle Cerwyn by nightfall.”

“Oh,” she said, feeling the loss of his hand in hers as an actual pain. “We must ride on then.”

“Yes,” he said. “And when we reach the castle, I shall share you with our daughter, but no one else. Once she is content, I intend to keep you in our chamber all to myself, and anyone else who has need of us can go hang.”

With those words, he kicked his horse and started back down the trail at nearly a gallop. Laughing out loud, Catelyn kicked her own horse once more and started after him, eager to reach her daughter and eager to return to her husband’s arms.

 _I love him,_ she said to herself as she rode, allowing her mind to form the words she’d so long avoided. _I love him._ She couldn’t say them out loud. She had not grown quite so brave, and even now she found herself wondering about the bastard’s mother. Had she felt the same? Had she said those words to him?

Catelyn pushed those thoughts away by kicking her horse even harder and overtaking her husband at a full gallop. She heard his laugh as she went by him and knew he would pass her again quickly. He was the better rider of the two of them. But he would not leave her behind. He did not want to lose her.

 _I love him,_ she thought once more as she heard his horse’s hooves approaching her quickly. Instead of passing her though, he simply matched his mount’s speed with hers, racing along beside her, smiling at her as if the sight of her gave him the greatest possible joy. _He does have a good, sweet heart,_ she thought. _Mayhaps I can trust him to hold mine._


	21. To Be a Queen for a Troubled King

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a sequel to "A Throne Unexpected," which appears as Chapter 9 of this collection. I wrote this in response to an anonymous request for more of that tale on tumblr, and it takes place immediately following the events of the earlier story.

Jon Arryn stared at the two of them and seemed to have further difficulty finding his voice.

“What is in Howland’s letter, Jon?” her husband pressed again. His voice was cool and controlled, but she still heard the fear within it, and while he stood still and straight, she could feel a slight tremor in the fingers held within hers.

The older man’s face seemed to crumble just slightly, and when she saw the sympathy in his eyes, Catelyn knew what he would say.

“There is no easy way to tell you, Ned,” he said softly. “Lyanna is dead.”

Eddard Stark made no sound at the news, but he gripped her hand so tightly, Catelyn feared her fingers might break. Still, she made no move to take her hand away.

“I am so sorry, Ned,” she whispered, turning toward him enough to lay her other hand upon his arm. The tensed muscles beneath his sleeve felt like iron. She realized suddenly that she’d used his name without thinking about it. She’d never done that before.

He turned to look at her for only a moment, but the pain in his eyes broke her heart. He then took his hand from hers and turned away from both her and Lord Arryn, walking to a window where he braced both hands on the sill. “Tell me all of it, Jon,” he said with his back to them. “Leave nothing out.”

Jon hesitated, and Catelyn realized he was looking at her. “Your Grace,” the Hand said hesitantly.

“Tell me, Jon!” Ned almost shouted, and Catelyn moved quickly to Robb’s cradle, but the babe slept on.

Jon looked down a moment. “I only thought that mayhap we should speak privately.”

Ned turned around then, the unspeakable grief still etched into his solemn features, but he looked back and forth between Jon Arryn and herself. “There is hardly a place more private than my lady wife’s chamber,” he said finally. “Catelyn is my queen, Jon. You may speak freely in front of her.”

“As you wish, Your Grace,” the older man said, but he still looked at Catelyn hesitantly.

At the expression on his face, Catelyn realized what his difficulty may be. He had wed her sister when Lord Eddard, now King Eddard, had wed her, and Lysa had arrived in King’s Landing along with Catelyn. While she loved her sister dearly, Catelyn knew that she sometimes acted little more than a child, and an unhappy child at that in regard to her marriage to her lord husband. She also had a tendency to either speak not at all or to say whatever came into her head without any thought before hand.

“I am not Lysa, my lord,” she said firmly, and both men looked at her as if surprised. “I mean no disrespect to your lady wife, Lord Arryn. I love my sister very much. But I am now Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. My duty is to His Grace, and I will share his confidences with no one, including my sister.”

Jon Arryn still looked doubtful. The king’s expression did not change at all, but he came to stand beside her once more before turning back to his Hand. “Now speak, Jon.”

“Your Grace,” Catelyn put in. “Perhaps we should sit down.”

Her husband nodded absently as if it didn’t really matter to him, but allowed her to lead him to a small group of chairs near another window. Jon Arryn followed them, and when they were all seated, the older man took a deep breath and began to speak.

“Howland and his men found her in that tower in Dorne just as Lady Dayne said they would.”

 _Lady Dayne?_ Catelyn schooled her features into a blank expression to hide her surprise. Her husband had not told her Ashara Dayne had been his informant. She had never met the woman, but had heard stories of her beauty, as well as how she had danced with Ned at the Tournament of Harrenhal.

“But she was dead?” Ned asked tersely, almost as if he feared speaking might allow some of the emotion he so obviously held back to escape.

“No,” Lord Arryn said quietly. “She was dying. They arrived to find our three missing members of the Kingsguard guarding her, and they fought to the death. Only Howland survived.”

Catelyn could not suppress a slight gasp at that. Nor could she keep from wondering why half the might of the Kingsguard would be at an isolated tower in Dorne guarding a ruined northern girl when Rhaegar was dead. She had surmised, like most people, that the missing members of the Kingsguard were with Aerys’s surviving children or at least trying to reach them.

“How did she die?” Ned asked. His voice was softer then, and Catelyn reached out a hand to lay lightly on his arm as both his hands tightly gripped the chair. He did not flinch or move away, and Catelyn realized that she was actually thinking of him as Ned in this moment rather than “Lord Eddard” or “His Grace.”

“It was a fever,” Howland said, looking again at Catelyn as if he wished she were not there. “There is some more to the letter, Your Grace.”

Ned closed his eyes then and looked even more pained. “Tell it, Jon.”

With another wary glance at Catelyn, Jon Arryn said, “You were right in your suppositions. And there is a child.”

“A child?” Catelyn couldn’t help but exclaim.

“An infant boy,” Jon sighed. “No more than a few days old when Howland found him.”

Catelyn felt Ned’s arm move from beneath her hand and turned to see that he had covered his face with his own hands. Turning back to Jon Arryn, she said, “And Lord Reed put all of this in a letter trusted to a raven?” she asked incredulously. The ramifications of such information falling into the wrong hands were enormous.

“You see why I asked you to speak in front of her, Jon,” Ned said softly beside her. “I have learned in a very short time that she understands such things much more quickly than I do.” Turning to Catelyn, he said, “I have no doubt there is nothing in that letter save that my sister and the men who fought are dead—at least nothing that anyone else could read.”

She looked at him, obviously puzzled by his words.

“I will explain it to you, my lady,” he said. “But first, Jon, what does Howland intend to do?”

“He intends to remain at Starfall, awaiting your instructions.”

“Starfall?” Catelyn asked, shocked. “Lady Lyanna was at Starfall? I thought …”

“No, Your Grace,” Lord Arryn said quickly. “Lord Reed went to Starfall after her death, to return the ancestral sword of House Dayne to his sister. The raven came from there.”

“But …how can he trust Lady Dayne not to betray him? He must have killed her brother, if he has Ser Arthur’s sword.”

“Ashara will not betray him in this,” Ned said quietly, and the certainty in his voice made Catelyn feel oddly unhappy.

Ned stood then and walked once more to stare out the window. After a moment, he said, “Tell him to ride for King’s Landing, Jon.”

“King’s Landing? But …”

“I know the boy cannot stay here,” the king snapped irritably. “I am not a fool.” He sighed. “Or, rather I am a fool, but not so great a one as that. I would, however, like to look on my nephew once before I send him north. Certainly we can find a way for one man and one babe to visit the city without attracting notice.”

“There will be a woman as well,” Catelyn said quickly, and both men looked at her. “A babe must eat,” she said. “Without his mother, Lord Reed must needs procure a wetnurse for this child to survive.” For one horrible, selfish moment, she wondered if it would not have been better for everyone had this babe not survived. She could see any number of problems the boy presented, and no easy solutions to any of them.

“That will make it even more simple,” Ned said. “Families come and go between the city and the countryside every day.” He looked at Jon Arryn. “Do whatever needs to be done. I will not keep the child here, but I would see my sister’s son.”

Jon looked at him a moment, and then nodded. “There is one other thing, Ned. If you would rather discuss it later …”

“What is it?”

“Tywin Lannister asked if he could send his son and daughter back to Casterly Rock immediately now that Ser Jaime is pardoned. He will remain in King’s Landing until his men have brought you Clegane.”

“Absolutely not,” Ned said. “Oh, he can send daughter to the Rock or anywhere else he’d like to send her as long as it’s away from here, but the Kingslayer doesn’t leave his cell until I have Clegane to put there in his place.”

“I’ll tell him, Your Grace,” Jon said, with the hint of a smile. “He won’t like it, but he’ll do as you ask. He has no choice really. You are the king, whether he wishes it or not.”

“And whether I wish it or not,” Ned muttered darkly.

Jon Arryn chose to ignore that remark. “I shall write to Lord Reed, Your Grace.” He stepped forward then and put a hand on the shoulder of the man who was his foster son long before he was his king. “And I am very sorry about Lyanna, Ned. I had hoped for a different outcome.”

Ned put his hand over top Jon’s briefly. “I know,” he said.

When the older man took his leave, and Catelyn was left alone with her husband once more, she found herself at a loss as to what to say. He stood silently at the window as if he were a million miles away.

“Can I get you anything, Your Grace?” she said finally.

“Do you think she suffered?” he asked quietly.

Catelyn sighed. She remembered all too well the pain of Robb’s birth, and it had gone very easily according to Maester Vyman. If Lyanna had died of a fever before ever recovering from childbed, she thought it very likely she had suffered, but she couldn’t say that to her husband. “I do not know, Your Grace. But I pray not.”

He looked at her then. “You are a comfort, Catelyn.”

“I would like to be.”

“Talk to me,” he said then, walking restlessly about the room. “Ask me what you would know.”

That surprised her, but she realized he was still trying to keep the grief inside him. Turning his mind toward answering her might distract him. But the only questions she had concerned Lyanna and the babe.

“You asked about Howland’s letter,” he said when she was silent. “When I first came here, I had hoped I might find my sister here. When I did not, I was bitterly disappointed. Then the crown came to me, and I found myself unable to leave and continue seeking her.” He sighed deeply. “What free time I had, I found myself spending in Rhaegar Targaryen’s chambers.”

“My lord?” His words shocked her so much, she forgot to use his new title.

He smiled sadly at her. “I once despaired of ever getting you to stop calling me that. Now, I find I prefer it greatly to ‘Your Grace.’”

She blushed, and then he continued. “I wanted to know the man. To know why he did what he did. What possessed him to take my sister. So, I sat in his chambers. I looked at his belongings. His books. Even his correspondence—what little of it remained there.”

“And what did you learn?”

“Not as much as I would have liked,” he confessed, but between the things I read in his rooms and what I gleaned from speaking with people who knew him well here, I did learn that he was rather obsessed with prophecies. Apparently, he believed at one time that he was the Prince Who Was Promised, but had more recently come to believe that the prophecy had to do with his son, Aegon.”

Catelyn could not see what this had to do with the man’s sudden desire to kidnap and rape Lyanna Stark, but she waited patiently for her husband to continue.

“What were the names of Aegon the First’s sister wives, Catelyn?” he asked softly.

“Rhaenys and Visenya,” she answered. Every child in Westeros knew that.

“And Rhaegar’s children with Elia of Dorne?”

“Aegon and Rhaenys …oh.”

“You see it, then. The three headed dragon of the Targaryens was missing one head.”

“He wanted a Visenya for his Aegon,” she murmured.

“And the queen was sickly. It was believed here that she could bear no more children.”

“Oh, Ned,” she said softly. “You think …”

“I do. I shared my thoughts with Jon and Howland, and before he ever left we’d decided upon words to use to communicate if my sister had indeed borne Rhaegar a child—different words for a boy or a girl.”

“The Kingsguard …” Catelyn said then. “If they remained with Lyanna and her babe after Rhaegar was killed, it must mean that they believed …”

“That my sister’s son is a legitimate Targaryen.” His control slipped then, and he slammed his fist down on a table as he walked past it. “Damn the man! If one wife can’t accomplish what you need, steal another! He’d make a better wildling north of the Wall than he would a king! He had all the honor of a wildling!”

Catelyn knew little of wildlings, but she did know how highly Eddard Stark regarded honor, and she found herself worried about this unknown babe. If his sister’s child truly was a legitimate Targaryen heir …She looked at her son, _the crown prince,_ sleeping peacefully in his cradle, blissfully unaware of his parents’ distress.

“Your Grace …Ned …what do you intend to do with this babe?”

He looked miserable at her question. “I am not entirely sure. But I will keep him safe. He is Lyanna’s son.”

She would expect nothing else from him. Still, she had to know if he’d thought of what might happen. “If this child is discovered by others, and he is a legitimate heir to Rhaegar, there are those who would seek to put him on your throne, Ned. You know that to be true.”

“He’s a babe, Catelyn.”

“He won’t always be a babe. No more than Robb will. Robb is your heir, Ned. The Iron Throne comes to him after you. Would you risk his inheritance?”

“I never wanted this!” Ned exclaimed. “I never even wanted Winterfell, but I would gladly go back there and be lord to be done with this place! Is it a blessing I give to Robb with this crown or a curse?”

She bit her lip, not wanting to cause him more distress when he already felt such grief, but needing him to understand. “You did not choose this cup, Your Grace, but it has come to you. The Iron Throne is yours now, and you will rule these kingdoms with honor. I know that. And you will raise our son to do the same. I only ask that you think carefully about whatever arrangements you make for this child your sister bore Rhaegar because the last thing this realm needs is more instability or more war.”

He nodded sadly. “I know these things, my lady. I do. And I shall try my best not to fail you and Robb as I failed Lyanna.”

His voice cracked as he said his sister’s name, and she went to him then, putting her arms around him. He accepted her embrace and leaned his forehead down to touch hers.

“You haven’t failed anyone, Ned,” she whispered. “You only ever do your duty. And you do it well.”

“My sister’s gone, Cat,” he said, his broken voice speaking her nickname as naturally as if he used it often. “Lya is gone.”

“I know,” she said. _His father. His brother. His sister. How much loss could one man stand and still remain standing?_ She slid her face upwards against his, feeling his beard against her cheek. There were no tears on his face, of course. He did not cry, Eddard Stark, but she now knew fully well that was not because he did not feel. She put her lips softly against the side his face and he made a soft sound almost like a cry before turning to put his own lips to hers.

He kissed her hungrily, desperately, and she clung to him, allowing him to find in her what he needed. This was not the warm desire of earlier springing up between them once more. This was more like a drowning man clinging to some hope of life. His hands were at the laces in the back of her gown, urgently working to release them without his ever taking his mouth from hers. She reached behind her to help him and felt the dress gradually loosen to the point at which she could push it off her shoulders and let it fall.

He did stop kissing her then, but only to grab at her shift and remove it from her as well so that he could put both his hands and then his mouth on her breasts. She suppressed her cry as he worried her nipple with his tongue and lips and teeth, for she definitely wanted their son to remain sleeping now. She nearly forgot that she had started this as a comfort to him as the ache between her thighs became unbearable and she felt herself grow wet with the need of him.

“Ned,” she gasped as he dropped to his knees in front of her and put his mouth right at the center of that need. She drew in her breath sharply and tried to keep her balance with her hands in his while his tongue licked and teased at her sex. When she thought she couldn’t possibly bear it another second, he suddenly pulled away from her, and she wanted to cry out in protest, but he picked her up and carried to the bed. He pushed aside the three gowns which had been so carefully placed there for her choose among for dinner, and laid her on her back.

“Ned,” she said again as she lay there watching him undress, needing to feel some part of him again between her legs to soothe the terrible want he’d created there. “Come to me. Please.”

He was naked before her in a matter of seconds, although it seemed an eternity, and he buried himself inside her as soon as he laid himself above her. She gasped at the sweet fullness within her and then clutched at him as he began to move. Normally, he was cautious and careful, ever mindful of causing her pain. Only when he was near his own climax did he ever lose himself completely even for a moment, and she’d discovered she was wanton enough to relish those moments.

Today was different, though. He thrust into her with abandon as if he could drive away his grief with the movement of his hips against hers, and she thought she’d likely bear bruises. Yet, she held him to her, her fingernails digging into his flesh, and met his every stroke. When he finally tensed and spilled his seed inside her, his cry was a single syllable—“Cat”—and whether it was the ardor of his lovemaking or the sound of her name on his lips that drove her over the edge, she didn’t know. But she came with him, tightening around him and biting his shoulder to keep from screaming out loud herself.

He collapsed onto her then, and neither of them spoke. Neither of them could speak for quite awhile. Then he rolled off her and sat up. “Forgive me, Catelyn,” he said stiffly, with his back to her. “That was …I should not have used you so.”

She sat up then and put her hands on his shoulders. “There is nothing to forgive. You are my husband. And I came to you. I …I wanted you, my lord . .Your Grace.”

He turned to look at her. The sadness was still in his eyes, but there was a tenderness as well. “If you would simply call me by my name, you need not trip over my titles.”

She smiled at him. “I wanted you, Ned.” Her cheeks colored to say such a thing while he was looking at her, but the smile he gave her then was worth the embarrassment.

The smile was fleeting, though, as his eyes quickly filled with concern again. “I would never want to hurt you.”

“I assure you I am unhurt.” She bit her lip. “We have a bit before I must dress for dinner. Lie back down with me?”

He hesitated only a moment before lying back down in her bed, and she moved to lay her head upon his chest and put her arms around him. He laid one arm over her back and used his other hand to toy with her hair. They remained silent that way for a long time, and she hoped he found some comfort from his grief.

Her mind wandered to such things as the many threats this babe of Lyanna Stark’s could pose, her nagging worry over why precisely Ned was so certain of Ashara Dayne’s trustworthiness, and whether or not Tywin Lannister would truly go meekly back to his Rock with his abominable son and daughter once the trade was completed. But she spoke of none of these things. That is not what her husband needed right now. She remembered how he’d spoken of her to Jon Arryn and found herself feeling hopeful in spite his grief and in spite of her worries.

“I think it might have been her choice.” Her husband’s deep soft voice startled her after so long a silence.

“What?”

“Lyanna. I found two letters from her in Rhaegar’s room here in the Red Keep. I think she might have gone with him willingly.”

Catelyn drew in her breath. To think that all the death and loss her husband had suffered might have been caused, at least in part, by his own sister was beyond dreadful. She didn’t know what to say so she simply tightened her arms around him.

“And if she did, Catelyn, I know it was a terrible thing. To betray Robert. To leave us with no word. To be so reckless and careless of everything that would follow.” He sighed heavily and his hand in her hair stilled for a moment. “Yet, even though it is terrible and I am wrong for wishing it—if she did go willingly, I hope she had some joy of it. I know she had misery and suffering, but may the gods forgive me, I do hope she had some joy as well.”

Catelyn lay still upon the chest of this man who had never thought to become her husband, a lord, or a king, and yet had become all of those things. She knew he wished for nothing more than a keep somewhere in those frozen lands she had never seen and now quite possibly never would. If he was correct about Lyanna, but for the actions of his sister, he might have had that life. Yet, he didn’t hate her. Just as he didn’t hate the men who gave him the crown he didn’t want. He would be a very fine king, indeed, she thought.

For these few moments, though, he was only her husband, a man grieving the loss of a sister he loved. “The gods needn’t forgive you, Ned. It is no sin to love a sister. If it had been Lysa, I would wish the same.”

His hand began to move in her hair again. and she felt him press his lips to the top of her head in wordless gratitude Then the King and Queen of the Seven Kingdoms lay once more in comfortable silence, keeping the troubles of the Iron Throne away from them for what few moments they could.


	22. Driving South and Driven Crazy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a modern AU written in response to a tumblr prompt from Veridissima for a "Stark family road trip"
> 
> Ned and Catelyn put the kids into their SUV and drive south for a family vacation in Disney World. Of course, after three days in a car, people tend to get a little crazy. :)

“How much longer?”

There was a collective groan as Rickon’s plaintive voice asked the question for at least the fiftieth time already. Catelyn had given up counting how many times he’d asked it yesterday or the day before.

“Only a couple more hours, Rickon,” she said patiently.

“And ten minutes less than the last time you asked,” Robb said with considerably less patience.

“Enough,” Ned said in a voice that would likely invoke silence for at least another five minutes.

From the back row of the SUV, Arya’s voice drifted into the silence, singing off key to whatever song was playing through her headphones.

As first Robb, and then Sansa and Rickon, began to snicker, Bran groaned. “Yeah, laugh it up. Now you know what I’ve been listening to for the past fifty miles at least!”

Even Ned laughed then. “Sorry, Bran,” he said, glancing into the rearview mirror to look to the back row. “Looks like your sister gets her singing voice from me as well as her eye color.”

Everyone except Arya laughed then because Ned’s comically bad singing voice was pretty much a family joke. Fortunately for everyone, he never attempted to sing unless he’d had more than usual to drink, which occurred only rarely. _Or when he feels the need to torture the children for the fun of it,_ Catelyn thought with a smile, squeezing his hand.

He turned to smile at her for a brief moment before looking back toward the road, returning the squeeze. Their hands lay intertwined on the center console just as they had been since the previous time Rickon had asked ‘how much longer’ and Arya had proceeded to tell him to ‘shut up already’ and he’d responded ‘make me’ and she’d punched his arm and he’d kicked her. Ned had then threatened to toss both of them out of the car and begun to question loudly why he had ever agreed to this trip.

Catelyn had intervened, taking Ned’s hand in order to calm him down and ordering Rickon to climb into the middle row with Robb and Sansa, glaring at her two oldest children so that they knew better than to protest. She’d then reminded Arya that after three days in a car together, no one was particularly thrilled with anyone else’s company so she had better show a bit more patience and understanding. Arya had responded with ‘whatever’ and stuck the earphones in her ears.

Her second daughter now pulled one of those out and said, “What’s funny?” which caused the others to laugh even harder. Arya rolled her eyes as only a twelve year old girl can, obviously convinced she was the only sane person in a family full of lunatics and stuck the earphone back into her ear.

“And we’re really gonna be at Disney World today? And not another dumb place with dumb beds?” Rickon asked.

“Yes, Rickon. We’re going to be in Disney World,” Sansa told him, and Catelyn smiled at the patience in her older daughter’s voice. At fourteen, Sansa was far too busy with her friends at home to spend much time with the family these days and had even made noises about staying home with her friend Jeyne Poole’s family rather than coming along on this trip, but Ned had decreed that if he had to come, then all of them had to come. And since they’d actually set out, Catelyn had to admit that Sansa had kept the most positive attitude of the bunch. “We’ve been in Florida for over an hour now,” she explained to Rickon, pulling up the map on her phone to show the child. And Disney World is …right here.”

“That’s really close!” Rickon exclaimed. “How many more minutes is it?”

“Mom just told you it’s a couple hours,” Robb grumped, and Rickon stuck his tongue out at his oldest brother.

At seventeen, Robb had originally been thrilled at the prospect of this trip when they’d thought Jon would be coming with them. Lyanna had given her blessing, of course. As her son had spent as much time in Ned and Catelyn’s home as in her various apartments over the years, she recognized that Jon considered his aunt and uncle and cousins as much his family as she was. And, of course, Ned was paying for it. But then Jon’s absentee father had unexpectedly decided to demand his right to summer visitation so Jon was off in California for the month with Rhaegar Targaryen and his wife.

Catelyn sighed. She hoped poor Jon wasn’t too miserable. He always told them that his father’s wife was nice enough to him, but he obviously didn’t feel comfortable around her. Catelyn didn’t imagine the poor woman was terribly comfortable around him, either, considering that she and Rhaegar had already been married with two children when the egotistical asshole began the two year affair with Ned’s sister that had produced Jon. She’d taken him back, though, and allowed him to maintain contact with Jon through the years, although she’d kept Jon away from her own children until they were all teenagers. Catelyn thought that perhaps it would have been easier for all of them if she’d allowed them to grow up as siblings, but honestly didn’t know if she could have done it herself had she been in Elia Targaryen’s position. She couldn’t imagine forgiving what Rhaegar had done.

“Holy shit, Jon’s as bad as Rickon!” Robb’s voice drew her back from her thoughts.

“Language,” she said sternly. “And what do you mean?”

“He’s texting me again. ‘Made it to Disney World yet, Stark?’

 _He wishes he were here,_ Catelyn thought. “This is his first text to that effect today, isn’t it?” she asked. “Of course, it’s only about 10:30 in the morning in Los Angeles. He’s probably just getting up.”

“Lucky guy,” Robb muttered. “Dad had us up at the crack of crack. Not that I slept on that awful bed anyway.”

“You got your own bed!” Rickon protested. “Bran and I had to share!”

 _Here it comes,_ Catelyn thought.

“How come we always have to share?” Rickon demanded, and she saw Ned’s jaw twitch slightly. This was not a new complaint.

“You and Bran aren’t the only ones who have shared on the trip. The girls have shared both nights as well,” she reminded her youngest.

They’d booked two double rooms in fairly inexpensive hotels in Lexington, Kentucky the first night and Macon Georgia the second. The girls shared with Ned and herself, and the boys took the other room. Since there were only three of them in Jon’s absence, Robb got a bed to himself.

“But Robb _always_ gets the bed by himself. Why don’t we take turns?” Rickon whined.

“Robb’s the biggest, silly,” Sansa said, ruffling Rickon’s hair. “You and Bran can share a bed more comfortably than he could.”

Rickon shook his head at that. “No, he isn’t. Dad is the biggest. Why doesn’t Dad get a bed by himself and Robb share with Mom?”

At that comment, Ned nearly choked, Sansa turned bright red, and Robb laughed so hard that Bran looked up from his book and Arya removed her earphones again. “Oh, god!” Robb said to his little brother. “I cannot wait until you’re about twelve. I’m going to remind you of this conversation and you are going to want to die!” he spit out before collapsing into hysterical laughter again.

Rickon didn’t understand the reaction he’d gotten and looked like he wanted to cry now, so Catelyn quickly said, “Your father and I are used to sharing, Rickon. Married people do.” She frowned at Robb in an attempt to curb his hilarity.

“I quite enjoy sharing a bed with your mother, Rickon. I’ve no intention of giving it up,” Ned said cheerfully.

“Ewww,” said Arya from the back, and Bran, who had only very recently had certain conversations with his father, looked vaguely ill and stuck his face back into his book.

“Ned,” Catelyn said softly, smacking his hand. “Behave.”

“I have been,” he muttered, and she laughed in spite of herself. He hadn’t been overly thrilled at sharing a room with their daughters the past two nights, and she’d found herself smacking his hand away a number of times beneath the blankets of those awful hotel beds while Sansa and Arya slept not ten feet away.

“I’ve told you that you can sleep by yourself in Disney World if you like, Rickon. There’s a bedroom for the girls and one for you boys, but there is also a pullout bed in the living room if you’d rather sleep there than share a bed with Bran. Everyone can have their own bed the entire time we’re there if you like.”

“Except you and Dad,” Rickon clarified.

“Thank God,” Ned muttered under his breath, and Catelyn shot him a warning glance.

“What?” he asked innocently. “We all have something special we’re looking forward to on this vacation, my love.”

She bit her lip, but she couldn’t honestly be mad at him when he looked at her like that. After five kids and more than two years past her fortieth birthday, especially after three days spent almost entirely in a car and roadside motels, she didn’t like to think too hard about what she must look like at the moment. Yet, he looked at her like that, and his hand moved from the center console to her thigh.

“Um, if you two want to be alone, the rest of us can just walk to Disney World,” came Robb’s sarcastic voice from behind them, and Ned pulled back his hand, putting both hands on the wheel and keeping his eyes on the road.

Catelyn felt the color heat up her own cheeks then, and she looked down for a moment before turning back toward the children to say brightly, “So, what are you all looking forward to doing the most?”

“Animal Kingdom!” yelled Rickon. He had been just past his first birthday the only other time Catelyn had managed to talk Ned into vacationing in the “boiling hot godforsaken swamp” as he called Florida, so he had no memory of Disney World. He’d been enthralled by the pictures online of the safari and the dinosaur ride in Animal Kingdom, though.

“Being tall enough to actually ride everything,” Bran said. He’d barely been five on that earlier trip and had not appreciated at all being left out when his siblings rode the larger coasters. In fact, Catelyn wasn’t certain if he remembered much about that trip other than what he _hadn’t_ gotten to do. She thanked God that Rickon was a good bit taller at six than Bran had been at five because she couldn’t imagine putting up with him being told no about any of the rides.

“Rockin Roller Coaster, Tower of Terror, Star Tours, Expedition Everest, Space Mountain, Mission Space,” Arya rattled off in rapid succession. Catelyn smiled, remembering how at seven, Arya had wanted to ride every thrill ride in every park multiple times—quite a bit less apprehensive about them than Sansa had been at nine.

“What about you, Sansa?” Catelyn asked.

“Oh, lots of things,” she said. “I want to see the new part of Fantasyland. Marg says it’s wonderful!”

Margaery Tyrell was a girl Sansa had met at a summer dance camp whose family lived in South Carolina and apparently traveled to Disney World fairly frequently. Sansa had been in near constant contact with the girl via text since this trip had been announced, getting advice about what attractions she absolutely had to do.

“And I’m really excited about our resort,” she continued. “Marg and her family stayed at the Grand Floridian when they came in April, and she says it’s beyond perfect.”

“It better be,” Ned muttered. The three bedroom villa for eight nights was insanely expensive, but he had been the one to say this vacation should be a big one. Robb would be a senior in high school this fall. Who knew when he’d come on a family trip again? And Sansa would be starting high school. She’d already balked about this trip. Catelyn feared the days of long family vacations with all five of her children would soon be a thing of the past, and it made her sad. Even if she had been ready to murder all five of them at various points during this road trip.

“It will be,” she said firmly. “This is going to be the best vacation we’ve ever had.”

He snorted, and she laughed at him. “Oh, I promise you won’t melt! And next year you can go back to picking out destinations in Canada!”

“Robb never said!” Rickon piped up.

“What, sweetling?” she asked him.

“Robb never said what he wanted to do most!”

“Look at hot girls,” Robb said with a grin. “And maybe do more than look if I find any I really like.”

“Robb Stark!” Catelyn said.

Robb laughed. “I’m only human, Mom. Seriously, I’m just happy to not have baseball or football practice, and I like most of the rides, and I can eat a lot more of all that good food than I could back when I was twelve.” He looked out the window then. “I just wish Jon could’ve come.” Jon and Robb had been twelve years old on the earlier Disney trip, and the two of them had been inseparable, racing about the parks with energy and enthusiasm from morning to night.

“We all do, Robb,” Catelyn said softly. Then, to lighten the somber mood that contemplation of Jon’s absence provoked in the car, she added. “I trust him more than I do you to actually follow the rules. Who’s going to keep you out of trouble this trip?”

“Hey!” Robb protested, but he was smiling again.

“I gotta pee!” Rickon announced then.

Ned sighed. “Do you really, Rickon? You can’t hold it?”

“Not for two hours! You did say two hours, didn’t you, Mom?”

“It’s still close to that, yes,” she sighed. “Pull off at the next stop, Ned. We can all stretch our legs a minute.”

He frowned, but nodded. She reached over to rub the tense muscles in the back of his neck. She’d done quite a bit of the driving over the trip, and they’d even let Robb drive a bit, but her husband had done all the driving today. Rather like a horse coming close to the barn, he’d been determinedly going forward, sometimes at speeds that caused her to shake her head at him.

While only Rickon had asked for the stop, all five kids nearly catapulted from the SUV as soon as Ned pulled into a parking space at the turnpike service plaza. He sighed and leaned his head back, closing his eyes. Catelyn watched him for a few moments and then leaned over to kiss his cheek.

“You want me to drive the rest of the way?” she asked him.

“No,” he said. “You’ll go five miles over the limit, tops. I’ll get us there faster.” He opened his eyes and smiled at her. “Let’s stretch our legs, as you said.”

He took her hand when they had both stepped out into the Florida sunshine. “God!” he said, as the air-conditioned climate of the car was replaced by the humidity of a Florida June. “Are you quite certain I won’t melt? Because I have my doubts, Cat.”

“I know,” she said. “Thank you for agreeing to this.” She put her hands up on his cheek and then let her fingers trail down over his neck and shoulders. “I promise to make certain you have a wonderful time.”

He put his own hands on her waist. “I intend to hold you to that promise, Mrs. Stark.”

She smiled. “You’ve seen the pictures of the master suite in this villa. Our dinner reservations in Epcot aren’t until eight o’clock. We’ll have a few hours at the resort, and I’m sure the kids will want to check out the pool. If Robb and Sansa don’t mind watching out for the younger ones, especially Rickon, we could take a little nap.”

“A nap,” he said, and she grinned at him wickedly. “Yes, I think I’m quite worn out by all this driving. I need a nap.” He pulled her against him suddenly and she squealed. “I definitely need a nap.”

“Jeez, get a room!” Robb called out, and Catelyn looked up to see him grinning at them as he came out of the snack shop with a coke and a bag of Cheetos.

“I already have one,” Ned said calmly, “and if all of you would kindly return to the car, I’ll be more than happy to get to it.”

Robb shook his head and rolled his eyes at the two of them, and then turned behind him to yell at his siblings. “Come on, guys! Time’s wasting!”

Sansa, Arya, Bran, and Rickon emerged from the snack shop then, all carrying drinks and a ridiculous amount of junk food for a car trip that had less than two hours remaining.

“What on earth?” Catelyn exclaimed.

“I gave them some snack money,” Robb said, shrugging. “Look if we’re busy stuffing our mouths, we won’t be bitching and moaning about anything, will we?”

“Language,” Catelyn sighed, but Ned laughed.

“That’s a brilliant thought, son,” he said. “Load up, all of you!” he said, much louder.

An argument about who was going to sit in which seat immediately ensued, and he looked at Catelyn and sighed. “Tell me how much airfare was again.”

“Nearly thirty-eight hundred dollars for all of us,” she said.

“Thirty-eight hundred dollars. Thirty-eight hundred dollars,” he repeated like a mantra. “It sounded like such a large sum back home in Michigan. Especially with all we’re spending on the resort and the food and the park tickets.” He looked toward their car, where the boys had apparently agreed upon their seats and climbed in, but Sansa and Arya still appeared to be having a heated debate outside the open car door. “Right now, I’m not so sure.”

“I used the money we saved on airfare to upgrade us to the villa with the big, private master suite,” she reminded him, tiptoeing to whisper it in his ear.

“Worth it,” he said immediately. “Get in the car now, girls,” he admonished their daughters. “Your father needs a nap!”

“Ned,” Catelyn said, laughing.

He grabbed her hand again and pulled her toward the car. “You, too, Cat. Get in the car. You look very tired. Let’s get you to this amazing, magical resort and get you straight to bed.”

She was still laughing as she fastened her seat belt. Ned reached out to take her hand over the center console this time, and as his fingers brushed over her palm, she found she didn’t mind the slurping and crunching coming from the back two rows that undoubtedly foretold all kinds of dropped food in the seats and on the floorboard. She wasn’t bothered by Sansa’s pout in the very back row where she sat by Bran and Rickon, and she did not feel compelled to admonish Arya for her smug grin as she sprawled out across the far less crowded second row beside Robb. She wasn’t even tempted to call out Ned when the speedometer went just above 80 mph. He was a careful driver, even if he was driving faster than she normally liked. Right now, as Ned’s hand trailed lazily up and down her arm, Catelyn Stark couldn’t get to Disney World fast enough.

“How much longer now?” Rickon called from the back, his mouth full of M&Ms.

“Maybe an hour and a half, Rickon,” Sansa said with a bit less patience than earlier, and Arya tossed a wadded up candy wrapper at his head.

“Knock it off,” Bran protested when it bounced off Rickon’s head and hit his.

“All of you knock it off,” Robb said. “I got us the food on the excuse that we’d be good and quiet, remember?”

“And you honestly thought that would work?” Arya asked him, grinning.

Suddenly, Catelyn laughed, realizing she wouldn’t trade any of it. Not one single minute she spent with her wonderful, exasperating family—the children who bickered and fought like wolves but loved each other through it all, and the man who would do anything to make them all happy, including spending over a week at amusement parks in a subtropical climate when he considered sixty degrees hot weather.

He squeezed her hand. “What’s so funny?” he asked her.

“Nothing. I’m just happy, Ned. I am so very happy.”

He glanced at her only briefly before turning back to the road. “Then so am I, my love,” he said smiling. “So am I.” He raised her hand up to his lips and kissed it. “I still need a nap, though.”

Catelyn laughed again, and her heart felt light as the Starks’ SUV continued down the road over the final miles to Disney World.


	23. To Bid My Lord Farewell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the tumblr prompt "Leaving Riverrun to go fight with Robert"

She still didn’t know him. Not really.

Standing in the cool early morning air with her cloak drawn around her, she watched Lord Stark (my husband, she reminded herself, _He asked me to think of him as Ned_ ) carefully checking the saddle and girth on his horse. His bearded face was set in that hard, virtually unreadable expression it so often wore, the one that had caused her to fear him as cold as his birthplace when she first laid eyes on him. _A lord’s face,_ she thought. Then she recalled some of the precious few words he’d spoken in the darkness of their shared bedchamber over the past nights. _The face of a man who never thought to be lord,_ she reflected, _and who is more unsure of himself than he wishes anyone to know._

He hadn’t said those precise words, of course. But alone with her, their bodies naked and close together, that hard expression had disappeared as he’d let down his own defenses in an effort to allow her to do the same. And she’d learned to listen closely not only to his hesitant words but to the tone of his voice, and to look closely at those grey eyes when the lord’s mask slipped. She had seen grief deeper than any she felt at the loss of Brandon Stark, but anger, too, that his brother had left all of this to him. And terrible guilt about that anger. She still didn’t know Eddard Stark, but she knew that much about him.

He left the horse and walked to converse with several of his men. Her eyes followed him from where she stood between her father and her sister. He was a careful, thoughtful man. He would not march from Riverrun without knowing every preparation for the journey was in order. He was not Brandon, whose impulsiveness would have had him gone already. Whose impulsiveness did have him gone already. Dead before his time.

Her heart gave that small lurch that it always did when it struck her that she would never hear Brandon’s wild laughter again or see the heat in his eyes as he pressed her against a tree in the godswood for a kiss she knew she should not allow, but could not deny him. He’d terrified her and delighted her and tempted her and made her laugh. She missed him. But she knew, as she watched Eddard Stark, _Ned,_ that she had not loved Brandon as much as her husband had.

That was another thing she had learned about the quiet, solemn man she had wed during their short time together. He was far from cold when it came to his family. His grief over his brother and father was terrible, and his fear for his sister something she could feel from him nearly all the time now that she had learned to read him just a bit. She could even sense the worry he felt for his young brother Benjen left alone now at Winterfell in the little bit he’d spoken about him. _He loves his family every bit as much as I love mine,_ she thought, and the words of her house whispered in her mind. _Family, Duty, Honor._ She knew the Stark words well enough. She’d embroidered them on any number of things over the long years of her betrothal to Brandon, but she thought that this man lived as much by her own words as by his, and that gave her a sense of comfort and hope about the future. For they were family to each other now. He had said as much to her that very first night.

She shivered, thinking of that first night. She could not recall ever being as terrified as she’d been standing naked before that expressionless stranger. The brother of the man she’d thought to wed. The brother of the man who’d kissed her until her her knees felt weak and her belly hot. Those kisses had left her feeling dizzy and somehow wanting more even as she’d pushed him away and made him stop. She’d lain awake in her bed as Lysa slept imagining what bedding him might be like. Then she’d found herself instead faced with the prospect of bedding a cold, distant stranger in his place.

“Are you cold, Little Cat?”

Her father’s voice interrupted her reverie. He must have seen her shiver. “A little, Father,” she lied. She certainly wasn’t going to share these thoughts with him.

“Maybe we should go inside,” Lysa said somewhat irritably. “They don’t seem to be in any hurry to leave, and we can’t simply stand here all day.”

“No!” Catelyn responded quickly, inexplicably frightened suddenly at the thought of taking her eyes away from this husband she didn’t really know. “Lord Stark and Lord Arryn ride to war, Lysa,” she said to her sister more severely than she intended. “The least we can do is see them on their way properly,”

Her father made a sound of approval at her words, and Lysa huffed, but Catelyn paid little attention to either of them. Her eyes were on the dark haired man who wore no cloak at all as he walked among his men this morning. He was of the North, he had told her with a smile when she’d offered to help him into his cloak this morning. Even the predawn hours in Riverrun felt warm to him.

He’d seen her terror that first night, but he hadn’t berated her for it. He’d called her beautiful and brave. He’d promised to be gentle, and he was. And if those first hesitant kisses had not set her heart racing like Brandon’s had, they had not been unpleasant, either. His touches were soft, if somewhat awkward. No doubt, she had been awkward as well. They were like two people trying to find their way through an unfamiliar land with no light to see by. But, for all that they were both acting from duty, she had seen the truth in his face when he’d called her beautiful. He had let slip that lord’s face he always wore, and she had glimpsed the warmth inside him. She had seen that whatever else he felt, he did desire her. And he was kind. If she had been brave that night, it was his own gentleness which had allowed her to be.

Afterward, he had held her for only a moment, apologizing for the pain of it. She had assured him there hadn’t been much and that she hoped she’d not been a disappointment. He had laughed then. A warm sound. A low, rumbling noise which seemed to come from deep within and was as quiet as everything else about him. She had never heard him laugh before. It was so different from Brandon’s loud bark of a laugh, and she’d found it somehow beautiful.

“You could never be a disappointment, Catelyn,” he’d said earnestly in that deep voice. Deeper even than Brandon’s. “Not to anyone. And certainly never to me. I know I am not the husband you wished for or deserve, but I shall endeavor to give you a good life, my lady.”

She remembered his words perfectly. So formal. So serious. Seeming almost too solemn as they lay there naked, his seed sticky between her thighs and her maiden’s blood still on his cock. Yet, she had felt the sincerity in those words and honestly believed the promise within them went deeper than any of the pretty words his brother had ever spoken to her. She didn’t truly know her husband, but she thought he was a man who meant the words he spoke.

He looked up from the group of men he stood with now and looked around as if searching for something. His eyes landed upon her, and he began to walk toward them. She did feel her heart speed up then, just a bit, as she watched the way his strong arms swung with his stride, suddenly stricken by the memory of those arms around her and those rough, callused hands stroking her skin in all her most sensitive places. While she had found little pleasure in that first bedding, he had been rather determined to make the experience as pleasurable as possible for her in the nights that followed, kissing her, touching her, stroking her and observing her reactions as carefully as he did everything else. While there still had not been that furious heat and sense of abandon she’d known so briefly in those stolen embraces with Brandon, her husband had gradually brought her to feel things she hadn’t known were possible, and when she’d finally felt herself come apart beneath his hand while his lips were at her neck, she’d thought she might die of the sheer joy of it.

Even now, as she watched him walk toward her and remembered the way he’d looked at her then, she felt that warmth low in her belly and had to catch her breath. She also felt the telltale heat in her cheeks and knew they were likely crimson. She had never believed she could be so wanton.

Lord Eddard, _Ned,_ spoke to her father first, thanking him for his hospitality. Her father would be riding off to war, too, but not quite yet. He had been injured at Stoney Sept and would remain at Riverrun a bit longer. Catelyn was glad of that. Lysa’s new husband was riding out with Ned this morning, and Catelyn saw that the older man was making his way over to them as well. So this was truly farewell, then.

Her own husband looked at her, and she saw him swallow, but he did not speak to her as he moved past her to bid her sister farewell. Little Edmure had appeared from somewhere, and her lord husband bent to tell him goodbye as well. Only then did he turn back to her.

“Walk with me, my lady?” he said simply.

“Certainly, my lord.” She took the arm he offered, and accompanied him a short distance to from the others.

“I confess I am loath to leave you, my lady,” he said when they stopped. “I would have you remain at Riverrun at least until your father departs. While I am anxious for you to be settled at Winterfell, I would not have you parted from your family too soon. Do not feel you must go north before you are ready.”

“I thank you for that, my lord.”

He put his hands on her arms then, and she looked up at him. The lord’s face slipped away, and she glimpsed the man she had only seen within her bedchamber. “Be well, my lady. I shall endeavor to return to you both victorious and whole.” A shadow crossed his face. “If I do not …”

“Do not speak of that,” she interrupted him. “I know what war is, my lord …Ned. I will pray for you.”

He smiled at her use of his name. “I don’t know how interested your Seven will be in preserving the life of a Northman, but I will appreciate your prayers, my lady.”

“Cat,” she said.

He smiled at her more broadly. “Cat,” he repeated. He reached out then and ran one hand down the length of her hair where it had come loose from her braids. She had noticed that he did seem quite taken with her hair. “I must go now, my lady,” he said with a sigh as he pulled his hand away from the auburn strands.

“May the gods go with you, my lord,” she replied formally. She gave him a smile and added more softly, “Be safe, Ned. I will be waiting.”

He nodded and swallowed once more. Then he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. “Be well, Cat,” he said, and then he turned away and walked toward his horse without looking back. He did look back toward her once after he was mounted, and she raised her arm in farewell. He responded only with the barest nod of his head.

 _I still don’t know him,_ she thought as he rode away beside Lord Arryn at the head of the column. _But I want to._

That realization caused her heart to seemingly skip a beat. She did want to know him. She wanted to go to Winterfell and learn what it would mean to be his lady wife. She even hoped that in their few nights together, they might have made a child. She would like to give him an heir.

 _Bring him back to me, gods,_ she prayed. _And let me truly know him._


	24. My Brother's Keeper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the tumblr prompt "Edmure and Catelyn as children at Riverrun"

“Where’s Edmure?” Catelyn Tully was very tired and thoroughly annoyed with both her sister and her brother.

“How should I know?” Lysa asked petulantly, as she tossed rocks into the Tumblestone.

“Because I asked you to watch him!” Catelyn said in exasperation. “You know I had to go help Father with the plans for this banquet. I only needed you to watch him for a little while.”

Lysa shrugged. “He was bothering Petyr and me, and I told him to go somewhere else and play.”

Catelyn took a deep breath and bit her lip hard to keep from shouting at her sister. “Where is Petyr then?” she asked as calmly as she could. “Could Edmure have gone somewhere with him?”

“I don’t know!” Lysa almost wailed, finally ceasing her rock throwing to turn and face Catelyn. “Petyr got mad and went off somewhere. He’s always getting mad at me, and I don’t know why! I never do anything mean to him. I don’t ignore him and treat him like a child!”

Stunned by the outburst, Catelyn stared at her sister. Taking a deep breath, she said, “No, Lysa. You are always kind to Petyr. Now, do you have any idea where he might have gone? And if he might have taken Edmure?”

Lysa snorted. “He’s looking for you, Cat. He’s always looking for you. And I don’t think he’s with Edmure because he already asked Ed where you were before I made Ed go away, and he said he didn’t know.”

Catelyn sighed. “All right. Will you help me look for him, Lysa? Edmure, I mean. Not Petyr. Petyr’s big enough to look after himself, but Ed’s only five, and it’s nearly time for the evening meal. We need to find him, Lysa.”

Lysa gave a fairly dramatic sigh, but then nodded. “I’ll go check the godswood and the kitchens. Maybe he got too hungry to wait for food. He does that sometimes.”

Catelyn smiled at her sister. “He does,” she agreed. “Thank you, Lysa.”

Lysa flounced off toward the godswood. She’d selected the easiest places to search, of course, but Catelyn was grateful for any assistance. Lysa was only two and ten, and she’d always been overly dramatic. It had only gotten worse in the three years since Mother died, and Catelyn didn’t know what to do about it. Any time she’d tried to talk to Father about it, he’d only said that Lysa was a good girl, and she would be fine.

Catelyn turned upstream and walked along the river bank, periodically calling her little brother’s name. She thought it unlikely he had gone to the godswood or anywhere else he would risk running into anyone. If Lysa had sent him away, he’d likely gone to sulk, and when Edmure sulked, he liked to do it all alone. Catelyn sighed. Edmure spent too much time alone. Her father seemed to have little time to spare for him. Lysa and Petyr both considered him too much a baby to bother with most of the time, and Father depended on her for so many things that she rarely had time to play with the boy.

“Edmure!” she called again. Still no answer. As she moved on, however, she heard a giggle.

“Ed?” she asked, turning around. “Edmure Tully, you answer me this instant!”

Another giggle.

“Please, Edmure,” she sighed. “I don’t have time to play hiding games now. I need you to answer me and come out where I can see you.”

She heard the rustling of leaves, and her very muddy, very wet little brother emerged from behind some bushes with a scowl on his face. “Nobody wants to play anything!” he grumbled.

Catelyn had been thoroughly irritated with him, but the sight of him standing there, looking for all the world like some urchin from a crofter’s village with that bleak expression on his face made her laugh. “What on earth have you been doing, Ed?” she asked him with a smile.

He shrugged, but his face lightened a bit as he realized he was not in for the scolding he feared. “Will you be mad if I tell you?”

“How can I know how mad I’ll be when I don’t yet know what you’ve done,” she said. She eyed his dripping wet clothes suspiciously. “Surely, you haven’t been swimming, though. You know you aren’t allowed to swim alone.”

He looked guilty. “Well …” he said. “Not on purpose.” When Catelyn looked at him suspiciously, he cried out, “Honest, Cat! Lysa told me I had to leave, and stupid Littlefinger called me a baby, and I’m not a baby!”

“No, Edmure,” she said softly. “You aren’t a baby. But how did you end up in the river accidentally?”

“I hid at first,” he said. “And I watched them. And Lysa wanted to play that dumb kissing game. But Littlefinger said they should wait for you, and Lysa said you wouldn’t play anyway because of Brandon Stark and Littlefinger said you would and then Lysa got mad and he got mad and …” Edmure had been talking very fast and then he just shook his head with an expression of disgust. “It was boring watching them just get mad at each other so I left. And I found a tree that fell down in the river. A big one. It’s up there.” He pointed further upstream.

“And you decided to walk out on it, didn’t you?” Catelyn said knowingly.

“I’m not a baby! I can walk where I want.”

“And you fell off.”

Edmure’s cheeks reddened, and she bit her lip to keep from laughing at him.

“Well, it wasn’t deep,” he said. “And since I was already wet …”

“You decided to play in the water awhile.” Catelyn shook her head at him. “Honestly, Edmure, what am I going to do with you?”

“You’re not going to tell Father, are you?” he said, sounding suddenly terrified.

“No. But we’d better get you inside quickly before anyone else sees you looking like this and tells him.” She held out her hand and took her little brother’s grubby hand in hers to walk him back. “I used to sneak and swim alone sometimes when I was little, Ed,” she said. “But one time I went out too far, and the current nearly swept me away. If Father hadn’t been near enough to hear me shouting, I don’t know what would have happened. You mustn’t go in the river alone. I couldn’t stand it if anything happened to you. Promise me, all right?”

“Did Father whip you for it?” Edmure asked.

“Of course not! He was angry with me, but mostly he was just thankful I was all right. And that I’d learned my lesson.”

Edmure twisted up his little mouth. “He’d whip me,” he said with conviction.

“He would not!”

“Yes, he would. He won’t ever whip you or even yell at you because you’re perfect. But I’m not. I’m willful and silly and not strong or serious enough to be the Lord of Riverrun. He’d whip me.”

Catelyn’s heart broke a little then. Her father loved Edmure dearly. She knew he did. But he had said those things at one time or another. Usually on very bad days when his bannermen had been badgering him to remarry. She knew many of them were concerned that her father had only one son. A new wife could give him other sons, but Hoster Tully didn’t seem to want another wife. Catelyn was secretly grateful for that. As much as she sometimes tired of all she had to do since her mother’s death, she didn’t really want to see another woman in her mother’s place. But being the one and only son put a lot of pressure on Edmure. Far too much pressure for a boy of five. And when the bannermen pressed her father for more heirs, her father had a tendency to press Edmure to be the perfect heir.

She sat down on the soft grass beside the river and pulled her little brother into her lap, heedless of the mud that would certainly get all over her dress. “Listen to me, Edmure,” she said softly. “You will be a great lord, and Father knows that as well as I do. You are silly sometimes, but you are supposed to be. We were all silly at five. Sometimes, I’m still silly.” She tickled him then, and he laughed.

She kissed the top of his muddy head, and ruffled the messy hair which was the exact color of her own. “Now, you are five, but you are not a baby, so I need to tell you something important.”

The little boy on her lap stopped squirming as if anticipating more tickling and looked at her with his most serious expression.

“Father misses Mother very much. I know you don’t remember her, but she loved us all more than anything. Especially you. Because you were her only baby boy. And Father knows how much she loved you, and that she had to leave you anyway.”

“Because she died,” Edmure said solemnly.

“Because she died,” Catelyn echoed softly, with a lump in her throat. “And I think he worries that as much as he loves you, he will have to leave you some day, too.”

“Father isn’t dying!” Edmure protested.

“No,” Catelyn agreed, “But he will some day, Ed. Hopefully, when we are all grown up, and Lysa and I are both married and gone and you are a big, strong man, ready to be the Lord of Riverrun.”

“I don’t want you to ever be married and gone,” Edmure pouted.

Catelyn ignored that. “Listen to me, Edmure. When Father says you aren’t ready to be the lord yet, it’s just because he worries that if something ever did happen to him before you are a man grown, you won’t have anyone to teach you, and so he wants you to know everything right now.”

“No one knows everything,” Edmure said confidently. “Not even maesters.”

“You’re right. But Father loves us so much, he wants us to know everything and have everything and always be safe.” She sighed and ruffled his hair again. “Can you understand that at all, Edmure?”

He twisted up his mouth and then nodded. “But he’s wrong,” he said. “I don’t want anything to happen to Father, but if it did, I would be the lord, right?”

“Yes,” Catelyn said hesitantly.

“And if I’m the lord, I won’t ever make you marry stupid old Brandon Stark!” Edmure said triumphantly. “So I will have you here to teach me, right Cat?”

Catelyn shook her head at the little brother who so often seemed more her own child. “You will always have me, Edmure,” she said softly. “Wherever I am.”

“Good! Is it time to eat soon? I’m hungry!”

She laughed and shoved him off her lap. “Well, let’s get inside then. Look at my dress! I’m afraid we’ll both have to sneak in and change without being seen now!”

Edmure’s peal of laughter gladdened her heart. As he raced off toward home, she watched him with a mixture of love and trepidation. _Please gods,_ she prayed. _Please let me remain here for a few more years at least._ Her father, while thrilled with the match that would make her the Lady of Winterfell, seemed in no hurry to have the actual marriage take place. Watching her little brother suddenly stop and wait for her to catch up, she was very glad of that. As long as she remained, Edmure could remain a little boy a bit longer.


	25. Summer Snow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written in response to a tumblr prompt "One of the Stark children's first snow"

“Cold!” Bran said incredulously, holding the soft, white snow that Catelyn had scooped into his gloved hands up to his cheek.

Arya laughed out loud. “It’s snow, Bran! Of course, it’s cold!” She then stuck her tongue back out and resumed trying to catch snowflakes on her tongue.

Catelyn smiled at her younger daughter. At five, Arya had seen precious few snowfalls that she could remember herself, but you wouldn’t know it to look at her. She’d been born just as the last winter ended, and in her earliest years, summer snows were fairly frequent, but by the time Bran was little more than a year old, the summer had grown so warm that no snow at all had fallen in over a year, even as far north as Winterfell, so he had no memory of it at all. Ned had smiled at the rapid drop in temperature over the last two days, and told all the children they may well get a good summer snow. The flakes falling rather thickly from the sky this morning had proved him right.

She had barely gotten the children to the Great Hall to break their fast as they kept darting about excitedly on their way through the courtyard, and they’d scarcely been able to eat once they’d gotten there. Laughing, she had told Maester Luwin that lessons could be dispensed with today, and that announcement was met by a raucous cheer from Robb, smiles from both girls, and a soft chuckle from Ned at the table beside her.

“I know when I am fighting a losing battle, my lord,” she had said simply when he looked questioningly at her.

Ned had business to attend to, but she had carried three year old Bran back to the Great Keep just as she’d carried him to the Great Hall. He looked at the whiteness on the ground with some trepidation as if unsure he should actually put his feet in it. The older children had quickly donned clothes suitable for playing in the snow and dashed back outside. Arya, predictably, had neglected to put on her gloves, but otherwise they had done a reasonable job of preparing themselves, and the little girl went back inside for her gloves more or less willingly when Catelyn ordered her to.

Catelyn had dressed Bran, bundling him warmly enough that he wouldn’t be miserable, but remembering that like all her children, he likely needed less layers than she did. It was a summer snow, after all, which meant it wasn’t bitterly cold, and her children all seemed to take after their father in terms of their tolerance for cold weather even if all of them save Arya looked like her.

“Does snow hurt?” Bran had asked as she fastened his cloak.

“Not at all!” she had assured him. “It’s soft. It is cold to touch, though. That’s why you must wear your gloves.”

Bran had nodded gravely, and this time when they’d reached the doorway, he had intentionally stepped outside, looking for places that the snow was undisturbed to try it out. As his booted foot sank into the two inches of snow covering the ground, he’d looked up at her with an amazed grin on his face.

“Pick some of it up,” she’d encouraged him, and he’d hesitated once more, which is how she’d come to kneel down and pile the snow into his cupped hands.

Now, he was grinning at her as he rubbed it on his cheek. “It is cold!” he said, ignoring Arya when she laughed at him. “Feel, Mama!”

He shoved it into her face, and Catelyn couldn’t help but laugh even as she got a mouthful of snow. She knew Bran was excited when he called her ‘Mama.’ He almost always called her ‘Mother’ now, trying to be big like the older children, and his use of the other made her smile.

“Look, Bran. We can make it into a ball,” she told him, patting snow into a reasonable sized ball for small hands.

“Can I throw it?” he asked in amazement.

“Certainly,” she said. “Throw it at your brother if you like.”

He looked at her as if he must have heard her wrong, but then ran toward Robb, the bastard, and the Greyjoy boy who were engaged in a fairly noisy snowball fight. She caught Robb’s eye, and her firstborn saw little Bran charging toward him. Smiling, he slowed his movements so that the little boy could catch him, and he fell down quite dramatically when Bran pelted him with his little snowball. The sound of Bran’s laughter made her laugh as well, and she watched as her ten year old son picked his little brother up and swung him around.

As she watched them, she was grabbed from behind herself and swung around in the snow by a pair of strong arms that she knew well.

“Come to play with us, my lord?” she asked as her husband set her down, smiling.

“For a bit, at least,” he answered. “They seem to be enjoying themselves.”

“They are. Look at Bran!”

Bran was now making his own snowballs or at least some semblance of snowballs and cackling as he tossed them at the older boys. All three of them were being very tolerant of the little boy’s presence, Catelyn grudgingly admitted.

With a loud yell, Arya suddenly jumped into the fray, apparently having had enough of catching snowflakes with her tongue. When Ned’s bastard hit her solidly in the chest with a snowball, she dove at his legs, causing him to lose his balance and fall to the ground, and she stood up grinning triumphantly.

Ned laughed at her, and then his expression turned wistful and Catelyn knew he thought of the sister he had lost. She’d heard at least a thousand times from multiple people in the castle that Arya was the image of Lyanna Stark in both looks and temperament. Ned himself never said much about it, but then he rarely mentioned his dead siblings at all. It still pained him after all these years, and she reached for his hand.

He turned to smile at her as he took her hand. “Where is Sansa?” he asked.

She smiled and pointed in the other direction. Their older daughter was building something in the snow and had gone quite a distance away in order to protect it from her siblings’ snowballs. Ned kissed Catelyn’s cheek and walked over to their daughter. Catelyn smiled as she watched him kneel down in the snow and begin assisting Sansa in her efforts. She almost walked over to join them, but decided to let them be. Individual time with their father was something all the children prized, so she let Sansa have this time for as long as it might last. She suspected that once the others became aware of Ned’s presence, they would all be vying for his attention.

“Mama! Look!” Bran’s shout caused her to look back toward the other children. They were all now lying on their backs, waving their arms and legs back and forth to make patterns in the snow. As Bran jumped up to show her what he’d done, she clapped for him, and he grinned. Then they all circled up as if whispering about something, and Catelyn saw they were all laughing conspiratorially except for Jon Snow, who looked rather unhappy about whatever was being planned.

A few moments later, Bran came walking toward her with his hands behind his back, an exaggerated expression of innocence on his face.

“Hello, Mother,” he said when he reached her.

“Hello, Bran,” she answered, smiling at him.

Without another word, he pelted her with the snowball hidden behind his back and turned to run back toward the laughing children. “I bet you can’t get me!” he shouted as he ran.

She knew they didn’t expect her to actually join the fight, but she bent down and made a snowball and ran right into the middle of the group of surprised children, hitting Robb right in the chest with her snowball.

After that, snowballs flew furiously. Her hood came down and she had snow in her hair, but she chased Robb and Arya and Bran around the courtyard and tried to dodge the snowballs they threw at her. Theon and Ned’s bastard continued to play, but remained more on the periphery as neither boy would risk hitting her with snowballs.

When she felt a large snowball hit her in the back, she spun around thinking that one of those two boys must have actually thrown something at her, but she found herself looking at Sansa who stood there looking up at her with a half apologetic look on her face.

Catelyn smiled at her. “You’ve got good aim, Sansa, but now I’ll have to get you!”

Sansa grinned and then ran toward her siblings as Catelyn bent to make a snowball. She made certain she at least got Sansa once before she left the children to their game and went to find Ned standing beside what appeared to be a snowman. No, a snow princess, Catelyn thought. Complete with a crown made out of loose stones.

“Sometimes I cannot believe how beautiful you are,” he said as she she approached.

She laughed. “I am a cold, soggy mess at the moment,” she said, shaking snow from her hair.

“You are beautiful,” he insisted. “Snow agrees with you, my lady.”

She smiled at him. “Well, since I am wed to a Stark, I would hope so.”

He laughed then and pulled her to stand close beside him. It was not quite as uncharacteristic as spinning her round in the snow had been earlier, but it was still far less reserved than his normal manner outdoors. “I believe you are as excited about the snow as your children, my lord.”

“I do like it,” he confessed. “I don’t remember the last time we’ve gone so long without it.”

“Do you think summer is waning, Ned?” she asked.

He laughed at that. “No,” he told her certainly. “This is merely a summer snow. It will be warm again before we know it, and this will melt and be gone. I believe this summer will prove to be a long one, just as the maesters have predicted.”

“Good,” she said. “I may be the Lady of Winterfell, but I fear I still have Tully blood.”

“Are you cold, Cat?”

“A bit. I need to go inside anyway. I’m just hesitant to leave Bran.”

“He’s fine,” Ned assured her, “And I’ll remain a bit. Sansa was desperate to join the snowball fight. Anyone could see it, but she wouldn’t go until I promised to remain and guard Princess Snowflake here.”

Catelyn laughed. “I shall leave the children in your care then, my lord, and go inside where it’s warm.”

“I shall be happy to warm you later, my lady.” The barest increase in pressure from the hand that held hers and the slight deepening of his voice made her feel rather warm where she stood.

“I shall look forward to it, my lord,” she assured him.

Much later, as she put an exhausted Bran to bed, the boy talked on and on about everything they had done in the snow.

“So, you like snow, do you, sweetling?” she asked.

“I love snow, Mama!” he cried, reaching up to hug her neck tightly.

“I do, too,” she told him, realizing that she did. She loved snow because it made her children laugh and caused her husband to lose some of his reserve. She loved snow because she had wed the winter and found it to be warmer than she’d ever hoped. I have become a Stark, she thought with smile, even if I’ll always get cold here.

“Will it snow more tomorrow?” Bran asked. “I want it to snow every day!”

She smiled at her youngest child and kissed his forehead. “I don’t know about tomorrow, Bran. And it won’t snow every day. But it will snow again. Winterfell is made for snow, and so are Starks, little wolf pup. So, I promise you that you will see plenty more snows in your life.”

“Good,” he said sleepily.

She left him there to dream of his first day spent playing in the snow and went to her own chamber, content in the knowledge that her husband would be waiting there to warm her.


	26. The Only One I Want

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for a tumblr prompt "modern AU NedxCat--pillow talk" 
> 
> I started with pillow talk and somehow wound up with a healthy dose of Ned having to reassure a jealous Catelyn! :D

“What are you thinking?” Catelyn asked as she trailed her hand lazily up and down his side.

“Nothing,” Ned laughed, putting both arms around her tightly and raising off his pillow just enough to kiss the top of her head where it lay on his chest. “Rational thought has not yet returned, my love.”

She laughed at that, turning herself in her arms so that she lay on her belly, chin resting on her hands on his chest, blue eyes looking into his. “Really?” she asked. Her tone was teasing, but he saw the uncertainty, the tiny bit of insecurity in the face he loved so much.

“Cat,” he said. “That was the best welcome home any man has received since …well, since the last time you welcomed me home from one of these damned business trips. If it were up to me, neither of us would ever leave this bed, and I would never be able to think rationally again.”

She laughed again. “Well, as delightful as that sounds, the kids would probably object once the food ran out.”

“Damn,” he said. “You’re right. You know, someone should really have told us just how often those creatures eat before we had all those children.”

“Well,” she said, flopping on her back beside him and snuggling up against him, “At least they’re all old enough to get their own breakfast on occasion now. The pantry is stocked up with terribly nutritious things like Pop-Tarts and cereal, so at least we can sleep in tomorrow morning.”

“Mmm. So I don’t have to feel guilty if I decide to keep you awake longer?”

“Not at all.”

He raised up on his elbow to look down at her, auburn hair splayed out on the pillow behind her head. God, she was beautiful. He reached a hand out to cup one of her breasts.

“Ned …”

He moved his eyes from her pink nipples back up to her face and saw that uncertain look in her eyes again.

“You aren’t tired of me?”

“I’m tired of a great many things, Cat. And at my age, I’m just plain tired more often than I’d like. But I will never be tired of you.”

She bit her lip. “How many times do think we’ve made love?”

He laughed out loud at that. “Oh, we’re well into the tens of thousands by now. Maybe even a million after all these years.” He grinned at her. “You’re quite insatiable, my love.”

She frowned at him. “I’m being serious, Ned. It doesn’t get boring for you? Nearly twenty years now of the same old sex with the same old woman?”

He sighed. “Is it boring for you?”

“No!” she exclaimed. “Never! I just …I want to be able to leave you unable to think,” she said with the hint of a teasing smile in spite of her insecurity, “But I’m not twenty anymore.”

“No. You are forty-three. And I am forty-four. And you are the most beautiful woman on the planet, and I am possibly the most ordinary man, so maybe I should be the one worrying about this.”

“You aren’t ordinary,” she said. “That new girl in your office certainly doesn’t think so. She flirts with you shamelessly even when I’m right there.”

“Does she?”

She punched his arm. “You always say you don’t notice the women who come on to you.”

“Well, if you’re there, I can’t see any other women. They tend to fade into the background.”

“You aren’t blind, Ned. You know perfectly well I don’t look like I did when you married me. And that girl is very pretty.” She hesitated. “Cersei Baratheon told me Robert took her along with you on this trip. She was livid about it.”

So that was where this was coming from. “Robert did have Carly come with us,” he acknowledged. “And he was sorely disappointed when she turned him down cold. Dragged me down to the bar complaining about her being ungrateful and possibly frigid.” He shook his head at the memory of his business partner’s ridiculous tirade. Robert Baratheon had been like a brother to him for most of his life. He loved the man. But there were times when he honestly did not like him.

“I don’t think that’s what her problem was,” Catelyn said sharply.

“No,” Ned said quietly. “You’re right about her, Cat. For whatever reason, she’s more interested in me than Robert.” He sighed. “I honestly hadn’t noticed her flirting before this trip, my love. I swear.”

Catelyn didn’t reply. She simply waited for him to continue.

“I left Robert in the bar that night and returned to my hotel room to find the idiot girl in my bed. She’d had the maid let her in!” He shook his head, feeling almost as stunned and angry in the retelling as he had been when it happened.

“What happened?” Catelyn asked in a small voice.

“I turned around and walked out. I had no idea what to even say to the woman! I went for a long walk, and she apparently got the hint because when I returned she was gone. The following day, when she was fully clothed and not in my bed, I informed her that her behavior was unacceptable and that she needed to find new employment immediately upon our return. And if she went quietly, I wouldn’t tell Robert or anyone else.”

“You should have told me.”

“I did tell you.”

“Only because I made you.”

Ned sat up. “Catelyn,” he said. “I fully intended to tell you this entire story, but I have been without the only woman I ever want in my bed for a week, and I’ve only been home four hours. I barely got through dinner with the kids for daydreaming about ripping your clothes off! I honestly didn’t even remember a thing about Carly the minute I saw your face.”

He leaned down over her and touched her face. “Don’t you know what you do to me? It isn’t only making love to you that drives all other thoughts from my mind. Sometimes just the sight of you does the same thing. And it always will, my love. Don’t you ever doubt that. Not ever.”

“I love you, Ned,” she said. “And I know you would never do anything to hurt me. I’ve never once doubted you’d always be faithful to me. You are such a good man.” She bit her lip again. “Sometimes I just need to hear that you’re with me because you really do still want me.”

“Want you? Have you not been listening to me?”

The smile she gave him then was entirely teasing and rather seductive as well. “I heard you, Mr. Stark. But I’m afraid I’m more of a hands on learner. Could you perhaps show me so that the lesson will sink in?”

“With pleasure, Mrs. Stark,” he said, putting his lips against hers and letting his body show her precisely how much wanted her.


	27. To Feel My Lady's Touch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for a tumblr prompt "NedxCat--But hands of gold are always cold/and a woman's hands are warm"
> 
> This is a canon-compliant additional scene to "A Game of Thrones" in which Ned Stark reflects upon his wife and his home just prior to going to the brothel with Littlefinger to see Robert's bastard daughter.

When Littlefinger had left him alone, Ned Stark sank down into his chair exhausted and mentally drained.

 _Robert threatened to put my head on a spike._ He felt sick recalling the words. Robert Baratheon, the man he had loved like a brother, better even than his own brothers in some ways, had threatened his life for daring to disagree with him.

He absently touched the place on his chest where the cold metal hand, the badge of his office had been affixed to his garments before he’d taken it off and put it down angrily before Robert.

“You were right, Cat,” he whispered to the empty room. “I do not know this king. The man I knew is not here.”

Thoughts of Catelyn made him think of Winterfell, and he wondered if she was there now. He had feared for her safety since hearing she had taken Tyrion Lannister captive for Lord Tywin would certainly wish to take the Imp back for pride‘s sake if not for affection’s. He wondered again what could possibly have occurred on the road to force Catelyn to take such action. While the Imp undoubtedly deserved to be arrested for any involvement in the attack on Bran, she knew their evidence was weak. They had agreed to wait. Something must have forced her hand.

 _Her hand,_ he thought, recalling with fresh anger the deep gashes across both her palms. How dare the Lannisters send a killer for his son? How dare they have a man assault his wife? Her poor maimed hands had clutched him so tightly in Littlefinger’s brothel as if she feared to ever let him go. In truth, sending her away then had been even more difficult than leaving her in Winterfell as terrible as that had been.

_I should have left with her. I should have taken the girls and gone with Catelyn. I do not belong here._

“We will all be home soon, Cat,” he said aloud, and he found some small comfort in the words. He and their daughters would be on the first ship out of King’s Landing, and they would be back in Winterfell with Catelyn and their sons as soon as he could get them there. Robert could give that badge to whomever he pleased, and Ned wished the poor bastard well.

 _And what if it’s a Lannister?_ The thought caused Ned to feel guilty at abandoning Robert in a veritable sea of Lannisters with no reliable man to stand against them. Pycelle was certainly their creature. And no one else on Robert’s small council could be trusted at all. Robert would be truly alone.

 _He made his choice, damn it!_ Ned’s hand clenched into a fist as he remembered Robert’s face as he insisted the young Targaryen girl must die. As he’d glared at Ned when he’d thrown down that metal hand and resigned his office. _I cannot help a man who will not listen. And when he learns what Catelyn has done …the Lannisters will want blood. No, the girls and I must go and go quickly. I cannot be Hand to a King who has no use for justice or mercy._

He closed his eyes and allowed his thoughts to drift to Winterfell, imagining himself there once more with a late summer snow falling and the children outside. He and Cat would watch them from the window as they’d so often done before, and he would take her hand in his. Her hands were always warm regardless of how cold she claimed to be. The touch of her fingers on his skin were ever soft and gentle, and always, always warm.

 _Yes,_ he thought. _I need her touch. I need the cool air of Winterfell, the laughter of all my children, and the touch of my lady’s warm hands. Mayhap then I can make some sense of all of this. But I am of no use to anyone here, including Robert. He’d do better to pin that cold hand on anyone other than me._

Resolved in his mind that he was doing the right thing, Ned smiled to think that this could be his last night in King’s Landing, and that soon his nights would be spent in his own bed with his arms wrapped around his lady. He decided that he would go with Littlefinger that evening to the brothel Jon Arryn had visited. He was no longer Hand, and he would not remain here, but he could do this one last thing to seek out the truth for Robert before he left.

Just one last thing. And then nothing would prevent him from returning to Catelyn and home.


	28. Swimming Lesson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for this tumblr prompt: "I'd LOVE something with Cat taking bb!Robb swimming for the first time! (bonus points for Ned being terrified about Robb getting hurt) :D"

The water was more than warm, and Catelyn sighed as she stepped into the pools, moving quickly to the place where it reached her waist and prevented her from shivering in the chilly evening air. While she would always miss the flowing rivers of her youth, she acknowledged that the consistently cold weather here would make swimming in any river impossible. These miraculous pools, heated by the earth itself, at least offered her the chance to swim a little bit—something she had never dreamed would be possible at Winterfell—and she frequently thanked the gods for their existence.

She was also grateful to her lord husband for allowing her to come and bathe in the pools as often as she liked even though he obviously found her habit strange. At first he had insisted upon always coming with her, watching over her as if some terrible harm might befall her in the water. Over time, she’d learned to recognize both the amusement and the desire in his grey eyes as he would watch her in the pools. He rarely spoke and never joined her in the water, seeming reluctant as always to intrude upon anything of hers. But he had taken to coming to her chambers on all the nights he watched her swim.

Of late though, he had found himself nearly buried beneath petitions from his bannermen and disputes among the smallfolk and rarely had time for evenings at the pools. Having apparently reached the conclusion that she was competent enough in the water not to drown herself, he never forbade her to come, though, for which she was immensely grateful.

Oddly enough, she found she missed having him there. His silent presence had become somehow comforting in spite of her lingering resentment over the bastard he brought into their home. She felt a heat in her cheeks that had nothing to do with the steam from the pools as she silently admitted to herself that she had also come to enjoy the nights he came to her bed very much—and not only because she desired to have another child. She had her pride still and had not forgiven her husband the insult he’d done her, but Catelyn was ever mindful of her duty—and Eddard Stark had proved a difficult man to hate or even remain truly angry with.

Regardless of her somewhat confused feelings about her husband, she was definitely pleased he had not offered to accompany her tonight for she thought he would likely disapprove of her plans. She had been waiting for an evening such as this for a long time. The air was still very cool, of course, but not nearly as cold as usual, and as long as a person remained mostly in the water and wrapped up quickly upon emerging from the pool, he should not take a chill. Even a very small person.

The small person in question wiggled in her arms, naked beneath the little fur she had over him and obviously confused about what she was doing with him. Ordinarily, if she picked him up and held him to her bare chest, it was to suckle, but she had no intention of offering him the teat just now.

“Here, sweetling,” she said, pulling the fur up to reveal his bare legs and then lowering herself more into the water until his little feet touched it.

Squealing, he pulled his feet up and grabbed more tightly around her neck as he attempted to climb up her chest to her shoulders.

“It is very warm, isn’t it?” she laughed. “And being a Stark, you probably fear you might melt.” She pulled the fur off him and tossed it upon the ground at the pool’s edge. Then she cupped her hand and began to scoop water gently over her son’s back and legs as she did when she bathed him.

He shivered once, but then began to giggle each time the warm water trickled over him, and slowly she began to sink down again. This time, he didn’t protest at all as first his feet, then his legs, and then the lower half of his trunk were submerged.

“There you go, Robb!” she exclaimed with a smile. “You may be a Stark, and the heir to Winterfell, but you are also half a Tully. And since you’re several moons past your first name day, it’s high time you learned about swimming.”

“Mama!” the boy shouted gleefully, smiling up at her. “All wet!”

She laughed out loud. ‘All wet’ was a new phrase, one he frequently heard in the Great Hall, as he’d taken to demanding an actual cup holding water when he sat beside her at meals, and his habit of knocking it over forcefully led to himself and any number of innocent people frequently ending up ‘all wet.’ He’d recently started shouting it himself, pointing at whatever poor, dripping person he’d drenched at the table and laughing unrepentantly.

“Yes, Robb. Mama is all wet, and so are you. Are you ready to swim?”

He didn’t understand the question, of course, but he understood that it was a question. Ever the adventurous little boy, he nodded his head, and she laughed again.

She turned him away from her, holding him against her middle with one arm around his waist just below the surface of the water. With her other hand, she patted the water to make it splash, and he delightedly and much more forcefully followed suit with both of his hands.

“Good boy!” she cried, pleased that her son seemed happy in the water. She turned him back toward her at that point and moved her hands to hold both of his arms, allowing nearly his entire body to go under water. Instinctively, he held his head up, and she began to walk backward, pulling him through the water. “That’s it, sweetling!” she exclaimed as he began to move his little legs in a kicking sort of motion. “What a smart little fish you are!”

“My lady! What is the meaning of this? I would have my son out of that water now!”

She nearly let go of her son at the sound of that angry voice. Instead, she pulled him up against her and spun around to see her lord husband standing at the edge of the pool. She’d been so wrapped up in Robb’s pleasure at being in the water, she hadn’t heard him approach. His eyes were the color of storm clouds and every bit as forbidding. His jaw was set in a hard line, and he seemed to actually tremble with rage.

“My lord,” she said, shrinking away from him in spite of herself. “We are only …”

“He is a babe, Catelyn!” It was as close to a shout as she’d ever heard from him. Only on that terrible night when she’d asked about the bastard’s mother had he ever spoken to her in such a tone before. “Have you no concern for the safety of your own child?”

“I …” Suddenly, she was angry. How dare he question her concern for their son? She had lived for Robb every day since he had been born. She had devoted herself to him even more when she realized that his father seemed insistent upon making him equal to a bastard, and there was nothing, nothing she would not do to keep him safe. “I am taking my son swimming, my lord,” she said coldly. “My brother, my sister, and I were all in the rivers at home even before our first name days, and I assure you this little, still pool holds far fewer hazards. And my son is always safe with me.”

Held up out of the water, Robb began to kick and fuss to get back down in it as his parents stared at each other in silence.

“What is wrong with him?” Ned asked, sounding alarmed.

“Nothing. He wishes to swim some more. You know as well as I do how insistent he can be upon having his way.” She did not loosen her grip on her squirming toddler nor take her eyes from her husband’s. _I am a Tully of Riverrun. I do not cower before anyone. Including you, my lord._

“He …he likes it, then?” her husband asked hesitantly. “He isn’t afraid?”

It struck Catelyn that Ned was still trembling slightly, and also that he looked rather pale. She looked more carefully at his face. The anger still showed plainly enough, but it occurred to her that her husband was more afraid than angry. It was not rage that made him tremble, but fear for their son. _He should trust me more than that,_ she thought, but she felt herself softening toward him all the same.

“He likes it very much, my lord. He is rather fearless, your son. And I shall not let him go.”

Ned swallowed. “Lower him back down then.”

Catelyn eased Robb back into the water and he instantly began kicking and splashing. “All wet!” he shouted.

Ned gave a shaky laugh and sat down by the edge of the pool. “You are certain you can hold him?” he asked. “I know how slippery he is after his bath.”

She felt her anger abate a bit more. Her husband had surprised her time and time again with his interest in everything Robb did, including such mundane tasks as bathing. She doubted too many high lords were even aware of how difficult a wet toddler was to hold.

“He is slippery, but I shall not let him go, my lord. I promise you that.”

“And you do not think he will catch a chill?”

She laughed out loud at that. “How many times have you told me Starks are made for the cold, my lord? He is your son.” She lazily moved Robb back and forth in front of her in the water as he splashed and babbled happily, occasionally squealing out one of his few intelligible words—most often ‘Mama,’ ‘Papa,’ and ‘all wet.’

Ned smiled, and her heart lifted to see it. His true smiles were rare, and she had discovered that they touched her heart in an unexpectedly deep way. “He is your son as well, my lady,” he told her. “It is quite plain to see that this little wolf pup is part fish.”

He sounded quite pleased at that prospect, and Catelyn’s heart lifted further. She worried endlessly about Robb’s entirely Tully looks compared to the obviously Stark face of Ned’s bastard and wondered if her husband thought less of Robb because of it. To be fair, he had never given her cause to doubt his love or pride for Robb. She only wished he didn’t so clearly feel so much love for the bastard as well.

“Might I …” He hesitated. “Would you mind if I …”

He looked uncomfortable, and she looked up at him questioningly, waiting for him to find the words to ask whatever it is he wanted.

“Could I possibly join you in the water, my lady?” he finally said in a rush.

That surprised her as he’d never shown any inkling of an interest in swimming before. “But of course, my lord. You needn’t ask.”

“It is only that …you are …” he swallowed. “You are bathing without any garments on and I should not like to make you uncomfortable.”

She laughed at loud then. “Ned!” she exclaimed, almost unconsciously using the name he so often requested she use rather than his title. “You are my husband! You have seen me unclothed any number of times. You share my bed!”

He looked rather embarrassed then, as embarrassed as a Stark could look, she supposed, as he never seemed to suffer the inconvenient blushing that so frequently happened to her. He forced himself to meet her eyes. “I am aware of that, my lady,” he said solemnly. “You are all a man could ask for in a wife, Catelyn. You would never be remiss in your duty to me in any way. I know that. And I am grateful. But I would not demand anything of you that you do not wish to do. If you prefer to have this …for yourself …I …”

“Come swimming with your son and me, my lord,” she said before he could find words to finish his sentence. “Please.”

He hesitated, but began removing his own clothes after a moment. When he joined them in the pool, Robb let out an excited squeal, and all but leapt out of Catelyn’s arms into his father’s. Ned was surprised, but caught him easily enough.

Catelyn showed him how to let the babe swim almost independently back and forth between the two of them, but always with a parent’s hand there beneath him to give him just the support he needed. They laughed together more than she could recall them ever doing before over their little boy’s excitement. Finally, Robb began yawning as often as he laughed, and she decided it was time to end this little excursion.

“All right, little lord,” she said, pulling him out of the water and holding him squirming above her head in the waning light. “It is past time to take you inside.”

Ned didn’t say anything, and she turned to find him. He stood there in the waist deep water staring at her with an expression both tender and hungry. Suddenly she was reminded very much of the fact that she was entirely naked, and as she stood there holding Robb aloft in the shallower part of the pool where water came just to the middle of her thighs, she realized nearly her entire body was on display. Her husband’s eyes moved over all of it.

“You are very beautiful, Cat,” he said softly.

 _Cat._ She had asked him to call her that, but he rarely did. And never outside of her bed. “Thank you, my lord,” she said, lowering Robb back to her chest and stepping out of the pool to wrap him up. She knew her cheeks were red, and she wondered if Ned had seen.

As she stood from wrapping up Robb, she felt the larger fur being draped over her shoulders from behind, and turned to see her naked, dripping husband standing there.

“You were shivering,” he said, taking Robb from her as she wrapped herself up.

“I get cold quickly out of the water.” She bit her lip. “I didn’t bring another fur. I didn’t think …”

“I am not cold,” he said. “I am a Stark, remember?”

There was a hint of a smile on his face, and she still could see what looked like desire in his eyes. As she took Robb back from him, she glanced downward and blushed to see the confirmation of that.

He had followed her gaze and quickly turned away to find his smallclothes and breeches, pulling them on over his still wet skin. “Forgive me, my lady,” he said. “But as I said before …you are beautiful.”

She smiled at him. “I am glad you came swimming with us. I think Robb would enjoy your joining us again if we get another evening warm enough for him.”

“I would like that.”

Warmed somewhat by the fur, (or perhaps her husband’s gaze), she handed Robb to him once more and dried herself as best she could before putting on her own clothes. When she was dressed, she looked up to see her husband standing there, Robb sleeping soundly with his head on his father’s shoulder. Ned’s eyes met hers silently.

“Some time, if …if it is too cold for Robb to swim, my lord, mayhap you would like to swim with just me.” She barely whispered the words and half regretted them as soon as they were spoken. She would not have him believe she was shamefully wanton.

“I would like that very much, my lady.”

She could easily hear the sincerity in his voice, and she smiled at him. “And now, I believe we should get your sleepy little wolf pup to bed, Lord Stark.”

“You mean my sleepy little fish,” he corrected her gently with his own smile. “Aye, my lady. And soon it will be time for his parents to retire as well.” He offered her his arm. “Would it be all right if I come to your chambers tonight, Catelyn?” he asked with his typical formality, although she could still feel the warmth between them as she placed her hand on his arm.

“It would please me very much, my lord,” she said as the three of them headed back to the Great Keep together.


	29. A Father's Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written in response to this tumblr prompt: "how bout some Ned bonding with one of his kids?"

It was always quiet in the godswood, a fact for which Ned Stark was particularly grateful on days like this one as he sat before the heart tree cleaning his greatsword. In truth, the silence and stillness of this place helped him to cleanse his soul as well, something he found essential whenever he was compelled to take a life.

It had been more than three years since his return to Winterfell at the end of the Rebellion, and he’d executed any number of men in the name of justice since then, but it never came easily to him. Even when the guilt of the accused was as obvious as it had been for this man. Silently, Ned asked his gods for whatever repose they could offer the soul of a murderer.

He thought of Catelyn and his children in the Great Keep. His son Robb would be either with his mother or with Jon as they were his two favorite people in all the world, and he could never be with both at once. _That is your doing,_ he thought guiltily, and he prayed for forgiveness of sins he had committed and sins he hadn’t, thinking that the difference hardly mattered anymore.

His infant daughter, Sansa, would surely be with her mother, and he allowed himself a smile at the thought of the two of them, both so beautiful, both so alike. Watching them together gave him no end of comfort and joy, although he feared his lady wife would never believe how much he cared for her. _Again, your doing,_ he thought once more.

Although the sword was spotless, he continued to wipe it, seeking some respite from his troubled thoughts in the repetitive motion as well as the silence of the godswood. All of his particular demons seemed to trouble him once his mind became unsettled about anything, and he would remain here before the heart tree until he had regained some measure of peace. Only then would he be fit company for his lady wife, his children, or anyone else.

He bowed his head and closed his eyes, asking the gods to grant him the peace he sought. Intent upon his prayers, he did not realize anyone had approached until he heard the childish voice cry out. “Ow!”

He turned around, startled, and found himself looking down into a pair of eyes the color of a summer sky.

“I tried to be quiet but I falled down,” his son said solemnly from where he lay on the ground not ten feet away.

“I see that,” Ned said, trying very hard to laugh. “Did you hurt yourself?”

Robb shook his head vigorously as he got to his feet.

“How do you come to be here, son?” Ned asked him, thinking that he must have slipped away from Catelyn somehow while she was occupied with Sansa.

“I walked,” Robb replied in the literal manner of three year old boys.

“And does your mother know you are here?”

At the mention of Catelyn, those blue eyes so like hers looked down.

“I asked you if your mother knows where you are.”

“Mother said you were here.”

That, of course, was not an answer to his question, but Ned decided to let that pass for the moment. “Did she now? Did she send you?”

Robb shook his head once more. “I wanted to see you. You were gone when we went to the Great Hall.”

Ned felt a small warming inside when Robb said ‘I wanted to see you.’ While he knew that both boys liked to follow him about at times, Jon tended to cling to him more closely. Jon had no one else, of course, but it still bothered Ned more than he cared to admit that Robb always turned first to his mother not only for little hurts or fears but with the majority of his questions as well. He worried that in his attempts to make certain Jon did not feel left out, he left Robb feeling that his mother cared more for him than his father did.

Looking at his son now, Ned knew he couldn’t possibly love anyone or anything on earth more than he loved this small boy and hoped that he could somehow find a way to leave him in no doubt of that. “I had to leave the castle very early,” he said. “But I shall be with you for the evening meal.”

“You had to exe . .exec …” Robb frowned, unable to quite come up with the word. “You had to kill a bad man.”

That shocked Ned. “Did your mother tell you that?”

Robb shook his head. “We heard the men talking. Jon and me.”

“Where is your brother?”

Robb’s eyes dropped to his feet again.

“Robb? I asked you a question.”

His little son’s eyes came up to meet his, and Ned found himself rather proud of the boy’s ability to look straight at him at such a young age when he so obviously had done something he should not have. “Mother said we were not to dis …disturb you.” In spite of making a confession, he seemed very pleased with himself for having remembered the word, and Ned found himself struggling not to smile.

“So Jon would not come with you, would he?” Ned asked, knowing full well that even at three, Jon had learned never to cause trouble and certainly not to do anything that might invite Catelyn’s ire. She was never cruel to the boy, but he wasn’t a stupid child and knew well enough she didn’t care for him even if he was too young to understand why. _A bastard’s lot in life,_ he thought bitterly, questioning not for the first time, and he knew not for the last, the choices he had made.

Robb shook his head yet again, and Ned wondered if the child ever actually said the word ‘no.’ “Are you angry with me, Father?” he asked hesitantly.

“Well,” Ned said thoughtfully. “I am not pleased that you disobeyed your mother. But I will never be angry at you for wanting to see me, Robb. You are my son, and I will always want to see you.”

The boy grinned, focusing only on the last part of Ned’s statement, and Ned found himself smiling in return. Robb’s face lit up as brightly as Catelyn’s did when either of them was truly happy about something. “I really did want to see you!” He ran forward then and flung himself at Ned who quickly laid his sword on the ground to catch his son up in his arms.

Robb looked down at the enormous greatsword with its dark Valyrian steel blade. “That’s Ice,” he said in an awed tone of voice.

“It is,” Ned said. “The greatsword of House Stark.”

“Maester Luwin says it’s old. Older than Old Nan, even. Is it really, Father?”

Ned chuckled at his son’s inability to imagine anything older than Old Nan and assured him that Ice was indeed much older.

“Can I touch it?”

“The blade is very sharp,” Ned cautioned, “But here.” He set Robb on one of his knees and lifted Ice’s pommel carefully. “You may touch here on the pommel only.”

Robb reached out his small hand cautiously as if the touch of the sword might burn him and then grinned up at Ned as his little fingers reached as far around the grip as they could just beside his father’s. “Can I hold it by myself?” he asked.

“I’m afraid not, son.” At Robb’s look of disappointment, he quickly added. “It isn’t that I wouldn’t allow you, Robb, but Ice is much bigger than you are and far too heavy for you yet. Someday, though, you shall not only hold it, but it shall be your sword.”

Robb’s eyes grew large and round. “Really? You will give it to me? How big do I have to get first?”

Ned laughed. “Well, son, I dearly hope that you will be much bigger before Ice comes to you. You are my firstborn son, Robb, and you shall be Lord of Winterfell after me.”

Robb nodded. He’d heard this many times before whether he understood what it meant or not. Ned rather thought that he didn’t. Not truly.

“Ice belongs to the Lord of Winterfell,” he continued. “So one day, it shall pass to you just as it passed from my father to me and from his father to him.”

Robb scrunched up his little face in thought. “How old were you when your father gave it to you?” he asked. “Ten, maybe?” Ten was as high as Robb could count reliably, but he knew that numbers went much higher.

“I was nineteen when Ice was passed to me, Robb,” Ned said softly. “But my father didn’t give it to me. He died, and so I became Lord of Winterfell.”

“But …why did he die?” Robb asked. Still several moons shy of his fourth name day, he was no stranger to death. He had known people in the castle who died of old age or illness. He had certainly seen animals slaughtered. And apparently he had been given some knowledge of executions.

 _My father was murdered by a madman for a prince’s greed and lust, my sister’s folly, and my brother’s rage,_ Ned thought bitterly, but he pushed such thoughts away. They served no purpose but to cause pain, and Robb was far too young to hear the manner of his grandfather’s death.

“He died early in the war,” Ned said instead. “You’ve heard about the war.”

“I was born in the war,” Robb said. “At Riverrun. That’s the name of Mother’s old home.”

“Indeed it is. Riverrun is the seat of House Tully. Your mother’s house.”

Robb frowned. “But Mother is Lady Stark and her home is here now. She belongs at Winterfell. Just like me and you and Jon and baby Sansa.”

“Indeed she does, Robb,” Ned replied, warmed by both his son’s insistence that his mother was a Stark and his inclusion of Jon in his list of people who belonged at Winterfell.

“And when I get bigger and we’re both the Lord of Winterfell and you give me Ice, will Mother be my Lady, too?” the child asked earnestly.

Ned sighed. Robb still didn’t understand, and he wasn’t certain that he was old enough to do so. Yet, as sure as this winter would pass, another would come in its place, and Robb must be prepared to deal with whatever life brought him. Ned had certainly learned that.

“There can only be one Lord of Winterfell,” Ned said gently. “I became the lord when my father died, and you shall become lord at my own death.”

Robb looked him for a long moment, and then he suddenly threw his arms around his neck. “I don’t want you to die, Father!” he exclaimed. “I don’t want the sword! I don’t want to be Lord of Winterfell! Please don’t die! Please!”

Ned was stunned by the outburst. He let Ice fall to the ground again and held his little son tightly until he quieted.

“I have no intention of dying at the moment, Robb,” he assured him. “I wish to see you and your brother and sister grow up. And, gods willing, even more brothers or sisters.”

Robb loosened his grip on Ned’s neck and leaned back to look at him. “I don’t want you to ever die,” he said vehemently. “Never.”

Ned swallowed hard around the lump which had suddenly formed in his throat. His son’s little face was a childish version of his mother’s at her most fiercely protective. He had seen his wife look at their children with that expression countless times and to see Robb looking at him the same way …

“I love you, Robb,” he said suddenly, unable to say anything else and all at once needing to say words that normally did not come easily to his lips. “I will never leave you unless I must, and I promise you I will do all I can to live a very long time so that I might hold your own son on my lap in the godswood some day. But everyone dies, son. Winter comes for us all eventually.”

“It’s winter now,” Robb protested. “Mother says it will be spring soon. She says I‘ll like spring.”

“Your mother is right,” Ned assured him. “Spring will likely be here within a year or two at the longest. And you will like spring and the summer very much. If the gods are good, summer will stretch out a good many years and we shall all be here together, Robb. That’s all you need to concern yourself with now.”

“And you won’t die?”

Ned ran his hand over his son’s copper head and sighed. “Not today,” he said finally. “Nor tomorrow or any day soon.” The events of a few years past made even this small concession feel like a lie for he had learned far too well how fragile any man’s or woman’s life could be, but Robb was young and would have time to learn that lesson another day. “Now, as I am quite certain your mother does not know where you have gone, we must go to her now so that she doesn’t worry. And you shall apologize to her for disobeying her.”

Robb twisted his mouth. “Will she punish me?”

“She will not need to. I intend to send you to your room once you have made your apologies, and you are not to leave it until someone comes to fetch you for the evening meal. You showed disrespect not only to your mother, but to my lady wife, and I cannot let that pass, Robb.”

“Yes, Father,” Robb said solemnly.

Ned couldn’t help smiling at his son. They both knew he was letting him off easily. He’d be within his rights to take the strap to him or make him skip the evening meal entirely, but he simply didn’t have the heart to do so at the moment. He set the boy on his feet, picked up Ice, got to his own feet, and placed Ice in the sheath on his back.

“Come along, son,” he said, extending a hand to the little boy which he accepted readily.

As father and son walked from the godswood, Robb suddenly stopped and tugged on his hand. When Ned stopped as well and looked down, Robb smiled up at him. “I love you, too, Father,” he said.

Ned Stark found himself unable to respond and barely able to breathe as he looked at the beautiful, perfect son the gods and his lady wife had seen fit to give him. _I love you too, Father._ The words struck directly into his heart. It occurred to him that every time he thought he couldn’t love his children more, he would find somehow that he did. After a moment, he squeezed Robb’s hand tightly, and they continued on their way as he prayed silently and fervently that the gods would grant him years enough to be the father that his son needed and deserved as he grew to be a man.


	30. I Would Banish the Ghost Between Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written in response to this tumblr prompt: "Would you write something with jealous!Ned?"

“She is a beautiful woman, that Lady Stark, isn’t she?”

Ned stopped walking when he heard the loudly voiced comment from a group of men gathered around one of the fires in the courtyard. Although summer had truly arrived in the North, and the days were quite pleasant, it still got cold rather quickly when the sun went down, and so multiple fires were lit to keep the attendees at this celebration warm enough to remain outdoors late into the night. Winterfell was filled with people from castles and keeps throughout the North, come to celebrate the end of winter.

Tonight was the third night of feasting and competitions and general revelry, and while he was pleased to welcome his bannermen with their households to reward them for their leal service through two wars in seven years, he found he was not entirely pleased by the amount of attention lavished on his lady wife.

Since unexpectedly becoming lord, this was the first large gathering he’d hosted at Winterfell for anything other than battle preparations as it had stubbornly remained winter when Robert’s Rebellion ended after the year of the false spring, and when spring finally did arrive, so did another conflict with the Greyjoy Rebellion. Now that summer had been evident for a year, it had been high time to feast his people.

He’d been daunted at the prospect, but Catelyn had not, of course. She’d taken housing, feeding, and entertaining hundreds of people in stride as calmly as planning a dinner for the two of them and the children. He could never have done this without her, but under her capable direction, the ravens had been sent, preparations made, and now he was nearly halfway through what appeared to be a successful event. And a good many of his people were getting their first look at the Lady of Winterfell who was often still referred to behind her back as “that southron girl.”

“Aye,” another man said now. “I wouldn’t kick her out of bed.” Ned clenched his fists tightly and considered moving closer and making his presence known. _Men will talk of women,_ he told himself. _It means nothing. Years spent with Robert should have taught me that._

“I’ve heard hot southron blood makes a woman warm and willing in the bed. Do you suppose it’s true?”

The men laughed, and another said, “Wyll here rode south with Lord Stark when he married the Tully girl and then rode to war. Did ye get to see her naked at the bedding, Wyll?”

“No!” the man called Wyll said. “Ignorant savages, the lot of you. It was only the lords in the Hall tearin’ off the lady’s clothes. Ordinary soldiers like us were stuck out in the tents, but I will say the girls they had serving us in Riverrun were warm and willing. They’d serve whatever we wanted if you take my meaning.”

The men laughed loudly again, and he’d almost decided to move on when the man continued. “Those girls talked about getting served themselves by the other Stark—Lord Brandon. The one the mad king killed. He must have been something to hear them talk.”

“Oh, he was!” came the voice of another man. “I knew Lord Brandon. When he was fostered at Barrowton with old Lord Dustin, he’d come around the Rills a lot to ride. He was a handsome man. The girls loved him and all us boys wanted to hang around him. He’d remember your name and clap you on the back and laugh with you whether you were one of Lord Ryswell’s sons or a stableboy. And gods, the man could ride a horse! Never saw anyone better at it.”

“I heard he spent as much time riding Lord Ryswell’s daughter,” said a boy who sounded to Ned to be no more than four and ten.

The men laughed again. “Aye,” said the man, who must have come with the Ryswells from the Rills. “I never knew a horse or a lass that wouldn’t let Brandon Stark ride, and Lady Barbrey was a pretty thing then. She smiled more—not all dour like she is now since Lord Willam’s been dead these years. Not that I think she ever cared for Willam Dustin as much as she did Brandon Stark.”

“Was she as pretty as Lady Stark?” the boy asked.

“Gods, no!” another man said. “I’ve not seen a girl anywhere in the North that looks like Lady Stark. That hair!”

“Her teats are nice, too,” someone else put in. Her skin’s such a soft, creamy white color. It makes you want to reach out and touch her there just where the top of her dress comes down like this.”

Ned couldn’t see him in the dim light from his spot in the dark, but he knew the man pointed to some place on his chest, and he wanted to throttle him. He had shoved a man into a wall the first night when he’d heard him make a salacious remark about Cat, but she’d gotten angry with him when she’d heard about it.

“Ned, men talk about women all the time. Surely, you’ve noticed that.” She shook her head. “I don’t like it, but neither of us can stop them from saying anything they like about my bosom or my maid’s when they are outside of our hearing. Do not be provoked to violence every time a man in his cups says something stupid or you will spend the entire week knocking people down.”

“I’ll not have you insulted,” he’d insisted.

“If any man insults me in my presence, feel free to defend me, my lord. I shan’t stop you then.” She’d smiled at him. “I want the people of the North to accept me, not resent me, my love. Please keep your temper.”

 _My love._ The words still warmed him every time she spoke them. It was only in the moons since little Arya’s birth that she had begun calling him that, and he had joyfully begun using the term for her as well. There was love between them now, and it both thrilled and terrified him, as he could not imagine that he deserved love from her after all he had done to shame and hurt her. Surely, she would have loved Brandon better. He had been far more handsome, more charming, and quicker to laugh. Catelyn loved laughter. He’d been a better dancer, too, and while Cat always declared herself well satisfied with Ned’s poor attempts to spin her around the floor, he never quite believed her. He could easily see how graceful a dancer she was when she was partnered by other men, and he imagined that she and his brother had cut a fine figure dancing together during Brandon’s visits to Riverrun during their long betrothal.

“Lord Brandon was to have married her first, you know” one of the men was saying now. “Lord Eddard only got her because his brother died.”

“Lucky bastard,” someone else said. “Winterfell, all the North, and that lovely woman along with it.”

“Don’t say that,” the Ryswell man said sharply. “Lord Eddard’s a good man. He’d never call himself lucky that his father and brother were murdered by mad Aerys.”

“Like as not, bedding that sweet little thing takes some of the sting out though,” the first man insisted. “And he’s already got three babes on her, so I’d say he beds her pretty often.”

There was more laughter, and then a man said, “Like as not, his brother broke her in for him. Hopefully, he doesn’t suffer too much in comparison.”

“Well,” said the Ryswell man with a grin in his voice. “We all figured Lady Barbrey closed her eyes and thought about Brandon when Lord Willam took her to bed. Maybe Lady Stark does the same!”

The sound of their laughter then caused Ned’s vision to go black, and he spun around to flee somewhere—away from their words and away from his own bleak thoughts—and nearly knocked over his wife.

“Ned!” she cried, holding up her hands as he barreled into her.

“My lady!” he sputtered, putting out his hands to grab her arms and keep her upright. “Forgive me. I didn’t see you.” She had a cloak on over the soft grey dress she’d worn today, but the hood was down and a fair amount of her auburn hair had escaped from the braids coiled around her head when she’d danced with him _and others_ earlier in the evening. The loose strands now curled temptingly around her face and neck, and as always, he wanted to reach out and touch them.

“I can see that,” she said with a laugh. “Where were you going in such a hurry?”

“I …nowhere. Have you need of me, my lady?”

She sighed. “I am afraid so. Arya has been screaming for ‘Papa’ for a good half hour now. I cannot soothe her with the teat, and the maids are done with her. Could you please …”

“I’ll come and see the pup to bed,” he said with a laugh. Since her first name day, their younger daughter had taken to demanding far more of her father’s attention than ever before, and truthfully, Ned liked it a great deal. Catelyn did far more with the children than he did, and he enjoyed feeling needed by them. “Are Robb and Sansa asleep?” he asked. He wondered about Jon as well, but he knew better than to ask Catelyn about him.

“Sansa is,” she said. “I found our son and the other boy in young Theon’s room, faces against that high window of his, watching a rather vulgar display by some very drunken men and what appeared to be two whores just outside the castle walls." She pursed her lips. “For a boy of ten, that child is far too interested in things he should not be, and I sometimes worry about his influence on Robb.”

Ned sighed. “I’ll talk to him.” He frowned. “I’ll see about this business outside our walls as well.” He didn’t allow whores within Winterfell although he didn’t prevent their trade in the surrounding towns. He didn’t want such activities directly outside the castle walls in plain view from the higher towers, though. He was not without sympathy for the women who worked in that particular trade as he knew most had few other options, but he did want them to remain in their brothels. He supposed the great numbers of men in and around the castle, many in a near constant state of inebriation provided simply too great a business opportunity. “You sent Robb to his room?”

Catelyn nodded. “Both of them went to his room.”

He knew she meant Jon and not Theon. Jon frequently stayed in Robb’s room, and while Catelyn would not even say the boy’s name if she could help it, she never forbade Robb from having him there, and Ned was grateful for that. “Did they see anything I need to speak to them about?”

She sighed. “They are six years old, Ned. I don’t know what they thought they were watching. For tonight, I’d just as soon they be left alone to sleep. Go and see if you can tame our wild wolf pup, and you can speak to Robb in the morning.”

He realized then that she looked tired. She’d been rising early and going to bed very late, and he’d been to her chamber every night during this gathering so far. He suddenly felt guilty at disturbing her sleep, but watching other men dance with her, ogle her, and continually speak about her face, her hair, her body, when they did not realize he was nearby had made him anxious to prove to himself and to her that she belonged to him each night. _Lady Barbrey closed her eyes and thought about Brandon … Maybe Lady Stark does the same._

“Ned? Are you all right, my love?” She put a hand on his arm, and he realized he was scowling.

“I am fine, Cat,” he said. “I’ll see to Arya.”

She patted his arm. “I will be in the Great Hall. Vayon tells me people are still coming in for food, and I want to be certain there is still something for them to eat!”

He smiled at her and went to see to his daughter. The babe was indeed screaming when he reached the nursery, but she squealed and reached for him, screaming, “Papa!” when he entered the room. The nursemaid gladly relinquished her to his care, and he began walking the floor, rubbing her back until her head drooped on his shoulder and he was able to lay her down.

He then left the Great Keep and headed to the Hall in search of his wife. When he entered, he saw that there were far fewer people than had been present earlier when the actual dinner was served or the dancing had been going on. There were almost no women present now save for serving girls, and the men who remained appeared far more interested in ale than food. A flash of red as someone standing moved to the side revealed Catelyn seated at one of the trestle tables surrounded by any number of men, and he heard the sound of her laughter. Quickly he walked to join her.

“My lady,” he said as he approached, and she turned to look up at him.

“My lord,” she said with a smile. “These men have just been regaling me with stories of your misbegotten youth.”

He looked carefully at the men seated with her, and saw to her relief that most were Winterfell men he knew well, and he relaxed slightly. He raised an eyebrow at her, and she laughed. “I am only teasing, my lord. In truth, all of the more riotous stories are about Brandon. Your men have assured me that my lord husband has always been a paragon of virtue.”

“Have they now?” he asked, staring at the man seated next to her until he moved to make room for Ned to seat himself beside her on the bench. He wondered what sort of tales they were telling her of Brandon and dearly hoped they were sober enough to recall that she had been betrothed to the man during some of his more famous exploits with women and would likely not appreciate those stories. _She is smiling, though,_ he thought. _Perhaps any tales of Brandon bring her joy._

He and Catelyn rarely spoke of his brother, and he knew it was because neither wished to cause the other pain or do anything to upset the delicate warmth and connection they had forged between them. But did she honestly crave stories of Brandon? Did she miss him so terribly?

He realized quickly that the stories being shared here were truly those from childhood. Pranks played on Old Nan. Mischief he’d long forgotten in what seemed to be another life. _Gods, Brandon,_ he thought. _I do miss you._ Then he looked at the rapt expression on Catelyn’s face as she listened to his brother’s childish exploits and felt a fierce stab of jealousy, immediately followed by the guilt which inevitably accompanied envying a dead man when you had taken his wife, his title, and his castle.

“I am tired,” he said suddenly. “I believe I shall retire, my lady.”

“I’ll come with you, my lord,” she said, immediately starting to rise.

“You needn’t,” he said, more sharply than he’d intended. “I have no wish to put an end to your entertainment.”

She looked at him carefully. “I am tired, too, my lord. I wish to come with you.”

He nodded then, and he gave her his arm. Together they walked back through the courtyard. It was very late now, and while there were still small groups of men around some of the fires, there were far fewer than had been present when he’d walked to the Great Hall. There were also some men passed out asleep near the fires. It was slightly chilly, but Ned knew it wasn’t cold enough for them to actually freeze. They’d likely wake fairly miserable, though. From somewhere in the direction of the stables, a loud voice suddenly broke into “The Dornishman’s Wife” very much off key, and he and Catelyn looked at each other and laughed.

At the sound of their laughter, a man sat up almost directly in front of them. Ned hadn’t seen him in the dark and likely would have stepped on him had he not sat up. The man looked up at Catelyn and grinned.

“You’ve got yerself a pretty one!” he exclaimed, slurring his words badly. “How bout we share?”

As Ned slowly made out what he was saying, the man was clumsily getting to his feet.

“You can take us both, right lass?” he said to Catelyn with a lopsided grin, reaching out for her.

“Don’t lay a hand on her,” Ned warned him.

“He doesn’t know who we are, Ned,” she hissed at him. “I doubt he knows who he is.”

But then the man suddenly moved with more speed and coordination than Ned would have thought possible in his state and grabbed Catelyn to him, putting his mouth hard against hers almost silencing her stunned yelp.

Ned didn’t know anything after that until Jory Cassel and two other men were pulling him up. He looked down and realized that the man was on his back and he sat astride him. The man’s face was a bloody mess and he was not conscious. Ned’s hands were a bloody mess, too, and he realized that his knuckles hurt. He looked up and saw that Catelyn was standing there staring at him, silent tears running down her cheeks.

As his vision gradually cleared completely and his breathing slowed, he noticed others had gathered around to watch the Lord of Winterfell beat a man half to death in the courtyard. Now no one moved, waiting to see what he would say or do. Standing now, with Jory behind him, his hands on his shoulders, Ned looked back down at the bloodied man and then at Catelyn. “My lady?” he said hesitantly.

“I would like to go inside, my lord,” she said almost in a whisper.

He nodded to her. “Have someone see to him,” he said dismissively, nodding his head briefly toward the man on the ground.

“Yes, my lord,” Jory said.

Then, Ned held out his arm to Catelyn and she took it, ignoring the blood on his hand and sleeve, and she walked silently with him into the Great Keep. He followed her into her chambers and she guided him to sit down in a chair. He watched her as she moved to a basin of water and dipped rags to wet them. Then she came and knelt down in front of him and began cleaning his hands. He breathed in sharply as the cold water stung the cuts on his knuckles.

“Some of this blood is yours, my love,” she said softly. “Your poor hands.”

“Catelyn …I …”

“He assaulted your wife,” she said simply. “You would have been within your rights to kill him.”

“You were crying.”

She bit her lip. “It was a frightful thing to watch, my lord. You were …” She shook her head. “I have never seen you like that.”

“I will never allow any man to touch you so,” he said fiercely.

She blotted dry his hands and stood up. “I am your wife,” she said. “I understand that you cannot let such insults to me pass. It is a slight to your honor.”

“Honor be damned!” he said, standing up and moving away from her. _Like as not, his brother broke her in for him. Hopefully, he doesn’t suffer too much in comparison._ Why wouldn’t that man’s words leave his mind?

“Ned?” she asked tentatively.

He shook his head. “It isn’t a matter of honor,” he told her. “Well, it is, but it is more than that.” He didn’t know how to say what he felt. He didn’t even know if he should. “The very idea of another man touching you makes me sick, Cat. I don’t like them looking at you or speaking of you as if you were something they might desire.” He looked at her. “Can you understand that?”

“Brandon said much the same thing about Petyr when he dared to challenge him for my hand, the foolish boy. He was insulted. He was offended. I thought he would kill him.” She looked at Ned for a moment. “I thought you would kill that man tonight.”

“No,” he said. “It isn’t about offense or insult, not entirely. It’s about you, and what you are to me.” He recalled her smiling and laughing about Brandon’s exploits in the Great Hall, and felt a stab of jealousy once more that her thoughts had gone to Brandon in this as well. _Maybe Lady Stark does the same,_ came the man’s words again. _Do you think of Brandon when you lie with me, Cat?_

“Do you wish I was my brother?” The words were out there before he knew he meant to speak them. He would take them back if he could, but it was too late, and what had lain unspoken, but always there between them, had now been given words.

“No,” she said simply.

“You were to marry him. You knew him. He came to visit you over the years. Surely, you had some anticipation for becoming his wife.” He found himself unable to stop speaking now. He felt almost drunk although he hadn’t had more than two glasses of ale, and those much earlier in the evening.

“I was prepared to marry him,” she said carefully. “But that was not to be. I am your wife. Where does this come from, Ned?” she asked him.

“I am not my brother, Cat. I know that well.” He heard the bitterness in his own voice and knew that she would, too. He sighed. “It is an evil thing to envy your dead brother. May the gods forgive me.”

Her eyes widened at that. “Envy him? Why?”

“I am not the husband you wanted. Brandon was …”

“Brandon is dead. You are my husband.”

“Do you think of him?” Then before he could stop himself, he asked, “Did you like his touch?”

She looked angry at him then. “What do you want me to tell you, my lord? That I long for your brother even now? That I loved him?” She shook her head, and he could see tears in her eyes. “Brandon was charming and handsome, yes. He charmed many girls at Riverrun when he came to see me.” She laughed bitterly at Ned’s look of surprise. “I am not a fool, Ned. I knew who Brandon was. He took what he wanted if it was offered, and he was not shy about making clear what he wanted. But he would not take from anyone unwilling.”

She sighed deeply and put the rags she’d used on his hand down beside the basin. “I would not lie with him. He would have had me had I been willing, but I told him he must wait until we were wed, and he found other ways to meet his needs.” She looked at him levelly. “But you know I came to our marriage bed a maiden. Why do you ask these things?”

“I do know that,” he acknowledged. “But I wondered if perhaps …”

“He kissed me,” she said bluntly. “And I allowed it. His kisses were sweet, but they are all I allowed him. After the duel with Petyr, he was …excited, restless …and he was rather more insistent, but I told him we must wait—that soon enough he would have all of me.” She bit her lip. “Of course, that was not to be.”

“Do you regret it?” he asked her.

She looked at him in surprise. “No,” she said. “I regret that Brandon is dead. He was a bold man, full of life, and he made me smile. It is unfair that he was killed, taken from his family by a madman.” She walked back to him and took his hands. He stood to face her. “You asked me already if I wished you were your brother. Did you not hear my answer?”

“I heard you,” he said.

“Did you not believe me?”

He couldn’t answer that.

“I am glad you are my husband, Ned. I did not choose you, and if you are insisting upon complete honesty tonight, I did not want to wed you when I did. You were too different from Brandon. You were a stranger. I was frightened—not of you, but of what my life would be as your wife. I had no way of imagining it, you see, as I had with Brandon. I never chose him, either, Ned, but I had become accustomed to him. That is all. But I would choose you now. If I were actually given a choice, my love, I would choose no man but you.”

He looked at her, wanting to believe her words, but finding it difficult. He knew she cared for him, but also knew her to be dutiful to a fault. He could not be certain where one ended and the other began. “I have brought you shame,” he said. “I have wronged you.”

“You have,” she said simply. She wouldn’t ask him anything about Jon. He had made it clear that wasn’t allowed, and she had never questioned him again. “But you have also given me more respect, more honor, more …gentleness and warmth than I had ever thought to find.” She bit her lip again. “That is why I was frightened tonight. When you were beating that man, I saw Brandon rather than you. I recalled how angry he’d been at Petyr’s daring to claim something that was his.” She shook her head. “And I recalled how he went with one of my maids that night, after I refused him. He would allow no one to touch me, but then he would …” She bit her lip even harder then. “I know that men have needs, my lord, but …”

“No,” he said vehemently. “Brandon was wrong then.” He knew he sounded hypocritical. He had brought a bastard conceived after their marriage home to live alongside their trueborn children, and he called his brother wrong for bedding other women while betrothed but not yet wed. “As I have been wrong in the past,” he added in order to speak fairly.

She said nothing, but did not let go of his hands or look away from him.

“But what happened tonight was not the same as what happened with my brother and Petyr Baelish. I confess I cannot stand for men to touch you for you are mine. You belong to me. But it is more than that, Cat. I want no one but you, and I want you to desire no one but me. I cannot stand the thought of any man near you because I want to be near you always. I will not shame you ever again, and I will allow no one else to shame you, my love.”

She continued to look at him. “I love you,” she said finally.

She had never said that before. He had never said it, either. Suddenly, holding her hands was not enough. He grabbed her to him and pressed his lips to hers, claiming her with his lips and his tongue and his hands in her hair, pulling down what braids remained. She clung to him and returned the kiss with no hesitation, and he knew she thought of no one else. As they clawed at each other, she was as desperate to remove his clothes as he was to remove hers, and he was vaguely aware of material actually ripping as their garments fell to the floor. He laid her down upon the bed and stretched out above her, unable to get enough of his skin in contact with hers. She moaned his name beneath him, and the sound of his name on her lips made him even more desperate to have her. _She thinks only of me._ He couldn’t wait. He moved his mouth over her neck and her breasts as his hands went between her legs to find her already wet. She truly was as eager to have him as he was to have her, and he pushed himself inside her, gasping her name as he felt her warmth surrounding his cock. When he began to thrust, she clutched him more tightly, urging him on until they both cried out, bodies tensing and shuddering as his seed spilled inside her and she tightened around him.

Breathing hard, he started to roll off her, but she kept her arms wrapped around him and held him there. “You are my husband, Eddard Stark, and I am your wife,” she whispered against his neck. He let himself lie there atop her as he softened inside her, but then rolled to spare her his weight even as she continued to hold him.

“I loved my brother, Cat,” he said softly after a bit.

“I know.”

“I would have him alive if I could, but I would have you as my wife. And I could never have both of those things be true.”

“I know.” She stroked his hair gently as she lay there facing him. “We cannot change what has brought us here, my love,” she told him. “But we can take joy in each other without dishonoring your brother’s memory. I do not belong to Brandon, Ned. I belong to you.”

He pulled her closer again and kissed her head, sighing into her hair. He had everything Brandon had lost, and he doubted he would ever be able to let go of the guilt that he felt for that. Yet, perhaps he could let go of the jealousy.

“I have something to tell you, my love,” Catelyn whispered then. “I have been waiting to be certain, but I think it is time.” She traced his lips with her finger and then reached to draw his hand to her belly. “I am with child once more.”

He looked at her incredulously. “You are certain?”

“I am. It is very early, but I know well how it feels to carry your babes within me by now.” He could hear the smile in her voice. “I hope we have another son,” she said.

_I have everything he lost, and I have no cause to be jealous of him._

He lay on his back and pulled her to rest her head on his chest as he had done countless times before. _She is mine, and there is no one between us._

“This is wonderful news, my love. But is it not too soon after Arya?”

“It is not too soon,” she assured him. “It was a bit of a surprise as she still takes the teat fairly often, but it is not unheard of.”

The men who looked at her with desire and spoke of her in lustful terms were far away. She was naked in his arms with his child within her body. Her full breasts pressed now against him had nourished his children and would nourish this new one. No man would ever have Cat as he did now. Not any living man, or any dead one.

“If we do have a son,” he said thoughtfully, “I think I would like to name him for my brother. If that is all right with you.”

She didn’t need to ask him which brother he meant. “I think Brandon Stark is a fine name,” she said, pressing a kiss to his chest. “You can tell him how his uncle was a brave and bold man with a name he can be proud of. And I will tell him how his father is a brave, honorable, good, and loving man, and our son will have more than enough reason to be proud he is a Stark.”

As she fell asleep in his arms, Ned knew he would likely always be jealous of attention paid her by other men just as he knew that his beautiful wife would ever attract the attention of other men, but as sleep reached out to claim him as well, he silently vowed to the gods, his wife, and his brother that he would endeavor not to be jealous of ghosts.


	31. Empty Nest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story was written in response to this tumblr prompt: "Ned and Cat discover that once Rickon leaves for college they can do whatever they want wherever they want whenever they want. ;)"
> 
> This chapter most definitely carries a "mature" rating. ;)

“Cat? Are you crying?”

Ned Stark walked out onto the patio to find his wife sitting at the table with her face in her hands. She straightened up at the sound of his voice and turned to look around at him, wiping the back of one hand across her eyes.

“A little,” she admitted. “I can’t believe he’s gone.”

He smiled and put his hands on her shoulders, and she leaned her head back against him as he massaged the tense muscles of her neck, shoulders, and upper back. “He’s hardly gone, my love,” he said with a small laugh. “He’s two hours down the road. We’ll see him again as soon as he’s out of clean underwear.”

Catelyn laughed. “I know. And I was fine leaving him there with his friends at the dorm. It’s not like we haven’t done this four times before. It’s just . . .” She sighed. “When we got home, I realized we’re really alone here now.”

“We’ve been alone in the house before, Cat. Quite often since Rickon got his driver’s license two years ago.”

“It’s not the same,” she protested, pulling away from him to stand up and face him. “We’ve never lived alone here, Ned. We had Robb and Sansa when we bought the place. Now, they’re both married and gone . . .”

“Robb and Jeyne live three blocks away . . .” he interrupted.

“And Sansa and Will live three hours away by plane,” she countered. “The point is that neither of them live here in this house anymore. And Arya has her own apartment, not that she’s ever in the country longer than a month at a time. And now that Bran’s in grad school, he’s even further away than he was at college the last four years.” She sighed. “I know very well I’ll still be doing Rickon’s laundry and that he’ll come home some weekends, but he doesn’t really live here anymore. And with the exception of the next few summers, he likely never will again.” She reached up and touched Ned’s temple, gently running her hand back through his hair as she’d done a million times before. “All of our babies have grown up and left us, Ned.”

He stepped around the chair so he could pull her tightly against him. “You want to make some more?” he asked her, grinning at her suggestively.

“Ha. Ha,” she said, smacking the arm that was reaching down to grab her ass and moving back just a bit. “That ship has sailed, sir. I am afraid you are married to a grandmother. Women in their fifties don’t generally have new babies, my love.”

“Well, I don’t believe men in their fifties particularly need new babies, but you can’t blame an old guy like myself who happens to be married to a beautiful woman such as yourself for wanting to keep right on doing what caused the little creatures in the past!”

She made a face at him and shook her head. “You’re awful, you know,” she told him. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were seventeen.”

“Oh, no,” he said. “I was an idiot at seventeen. I’m much smarter at fifty-two.”

“Oh, you are, are you?” she asked him, raising her eyebrows, and he was pleased to hear only a teasing tone in her voice with none of the melancholy of a moment ago.

“Indeed I am,” he assured her, lazily trailing one hand up and down her back as the other pressed firmly against that lovely round bottom to pull her tightly against him again. She didn’t resist this time. “I’m a better lover now, too,” he added, bending to kiss the bare skin of her neck just below her ear.

“Oh, you think so?” she asked him, tilting her head to give him better access to more of her neck. “What have you done to improve yourself over the past thirty years or so, Mr. Stark?”

“Practice,” he said directly into her ear. “Lots and lots of practice.” 

“Oh, really?” she asked him, and he was gratified to feel her arms winding around his neck as she pressed her breasts against his chest. “And do you believe that practice makes perfect?” she whispered into his own ear, tickling him with her breath.

“Oh yes,” he said definitely, sliding his hands beneath the lightweight cotton t-shirt she’d worn for carrying boxes up the stairs to Rickon’s dorm room in the oppressive August heat. He had her bra unclasped before she realized what he was doing and she inhaled sharply as he moved that hand around to the front of her to palm her breast beneath the cups that now hung loosely from her shoulders.

“Ned!” she exclaimed.

“You see?” he told her, moving his thumb in lazy circles over her nipple and feeling it stand up beneath his touch. “I’ve been well trained, too. Perfected that bra release years ago.”

She arched her brow at him. “And is there anything I should know about this . . .training . . .you’ve received, darling?” she asked him.

He laughed. “Well, it’s involved a prolonged series of intense private lessons,” he said gravely. “I can show you, but I’ll need you to take that shirt off first.”

“Ned! We’re standing outside in the middle of the afternoon!” she protested.

“Well, Mrs. Stark, as you’ve pointed out, we live here alone now. Just the two of us. And the house sits on over fifteen acres in what those younger people who no longer inhabit the premises have consistently referred to as the ‘middle of nowhere’.” Gently he began pushing her t-shirt up, and with only a brief hesitation, she raised her arms above her head. As he slipped the shirt off her and tossed it onto the table beside them, she let her bra fall forward onto the ground between them and he smiled at the sight of his now completely topless wife standing before him in the bright August sunshine, unable to recall the last time he’d actually seen her breasts outdoors in the daylight.

“My god, you are gorgeous,” he said before putting his mouth on first one nipple and then the other. As he teased both breasts with lips, tongue, and fingers, she made a very satisfied sound and then gasped, “Was this part of your lessons? I need to congratulate your teacher!”

He stood straight up again and looked at her. Her face was slightly flushed and her blue eyes sparkled with both desire and mischief. 

“Perhaps you know her,” he said. “Beautiful woman. Long legs. Long auburn hair. Eyes the exact color of that sky right now. She’s a very demanding instructor. But more than worth every moment I’ve ever spent with her.”

He kept his eyes directly on hers as he spoke, in spite of his awareness of the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed somewhat more heavily than normal. She licked her lips and kept her eyes locked with his. “I think I do know her,” she said, her voice sounding rather breathless. “Very exclusive. She’s only ever accepted one student, and I understand she demanded a lifetime commitment.”

“That’s her,” he said with a smile, letting his gaze travel down her over her naked breasts to her slim waist with her slightly rounded lower belly to where the white skin of that belly was separated from the barely tanned and freckled skin of her long legs by the small expanse of her dark blue shorts. “I signed that contract willingly, and I’d sign it again every day of my life.”

“You would, huh?” she teased him, moving her hands down over the front of him to where his cock had begun to stand out against his pants.

“I’ll do anything she asks at this particular moment, if she’ll just take off those shorts,” he said before groaning slightly as she closed her fingers around him through the fabric of his trousers and boxers.

“You first,” she whispered into his mouth, leaning in to kiss him without moving her hand away.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, reluctantly pulling away from her and pulling his own shirt over his head and then undoing his pants. Within seconds, he was standing there in his backyard completely naked.

He nearly laughed at the image of himself in his head--a middle aged man with grey hair, a golfer’s tan, a body that while still reasonably fit definitely showed the effects of time and gravity, and a very definite erection.

But then he looked at his wife. Her eyes traveled over his imperfect, aging body as if she couldn’t possibly get enough of looking at it, and when she finally brought those eyes back up to look at his, the pure desire he saw in them--desire for him--drove all thoughts of laughter from his mind as he couldn’t think of anything but making love to her right then and there.

“Take the shorts off, Cat,” he nearly growled.

After that, he wasn’t certain which of them actually removed the blue shorts or the bright pink panties beneath them, but in short order he had his naked wife spread eagle on the table and his mouth on the sweet wet flesh between her thighs while she made sounds he hadn’t heard anywhere but in their bedroom in the dark when all children were known beyond a shadow of a doubt to be out of the house for the night. Listening to her gasp his name and cry out as she thrashed beneath him in the sunlight nearly caused him to come undone, and he had to stand up, move away from her a moment, and catch his breath to keep from losing it completely.

She sat up, eyes wide and somewhat glassy, as she panted for breath and simply looked at him.

He moved to sit down on the big lounge chair with the cushions. “Come here,” he ordered, and she complied with a smile. He lay back and she straddled him.

“Now?” she asked, lowering herself to a point just above where he needed her.

“God, yes,” he said. “I can’t wait, Cat.”

She smiled even more widely at him then, took him in her hand, and guided him to where he needed so desperately to be. He was the one crying out now more loudly than he could recall doing in a very long time. She moved above him, sliding her self up and down upon his cock and rocking against him. He moved with her, thrusting himself upward and more deeply into her until she threw her head back and screamed as her body shook, and he knew she had peaked and he no longer had to try and hold himself back. He gave his own inarticulate shout as he grabbed hold of her tightly and came with his very next thrust--the sight and sound and feel of her sending him over the edge far beyond any possibility of self-control.

She collapsed onto him, and they both lay there panting. After what seemed like a long while, she began laughing, and he found himself laughing with her.

“I cannot believe we just did that,” she said when her laughter finally subsided. “You’d think we were the college freshmen! Acting like a couple of horny teenagers!”

“I never would have lasted that long when I was a freshman in college,” he said with a grin. “My god, you are hot, Mrs. Stark!”

He was rewarded with the flush of her cheeks that just over thirty years of marriage had not dulled his appreciation for one bit. Then she laid her head back down on his chest and sighed contentedly. “I suppose I can adjust to this empty nest business,” she said. “It isn’t like we’ll never see them.”

“Jesus, Cat, if this is a sample of the empty nest life, I’m kicking myself for not tossing all of them out of here years ago!”

“You are awful!” she said, smacking at him once more, but there was laughter in her words, and she snuggled up against him.

They lay there together in comfortable silence as he ran his fingers through her hair. “Cat?” he said lazily after awhile.

“Mmm?”

“Where should we try this next, do you think? I don’t think we’ve done the dining room table or the big staircase in the entryway.”

She laughed, and Ned realized that it was the same musical sound it had been on their wedding day. Thirty years of marriage, five children seen through diapers to driving to leaving home, and two grandchildren to start all over with hadn’t dulled the music of Cat’s laughter one bit or the magical effect it had on his heart.

“I do love you, Cat,” he told her.

“I love you, too,” she said softly. She sighed then and sat up, looking at him somewhat regretfully. “I’m afraid we really should go inside now, though, or else put our clothes back on.”

“I don’t want to put our clothes back on,” he said, intentionally mimicking Rickon’s famous pout. “Not ever.”

She laughed at him and stood up, deftly avoiding the hand that grabbed at her. “Then it’s inside we go,” she said firmly. “Because I warn you, Eddard Stark, if my ass got sunburned lying here naked in the middle of the afternoon, I’m not speaking to you for a week.”

She tossed her head then and turned to walk back into the house, giving him a lovely view of the ass in question and leaving him to pick up all their clothes. As he gathered their scattered garments and followed her inside, his thoughts wandered wickedly over a variety of things he’d like to try on that staircase, and he found himself rather hoping that Rickon didn’t come home _every_ weekend.


	32. The Price of Honor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story was written in response to a tumblr prompt: "I'm going to be a complete English teacher and give you a starting sentence and a closing sentence! So... your response must start with: 'It had come later, but it had never left them.' And it must finish with: 'And that was the price of honour.' "
> 
> So, other than Americanizing the spelling of 'honor' so my American word processor wouldn't keep trying to correct me (and to make my British friend laugh!), I followed the rules and wrote this little tale of Ned Stark's thoughts during his last night in the Black Cells after he's agreed to confess to treason and take the black in order to save Sansa.

It had come later, but it had never left them. In the complete darkness of this wretched cell, Ned Stark could still feel it—that connection to the woman that only his brother’s death and the cold, harsh necessities of war had made his wife. There had been nothing between them but obligation then, and perhaps a sense of shared grief and a desire to make something good out of all the pain.

 _We did do that,_ he thought, in spite of what had befallen them now. In spite of what awaited him on the morrow. _What we made was more than good, Cat._ He closed his eyes, not that he could see anything with them open, and imagined her as he’d seen her last—reluctantly releasing her hold on him, smiling up at him bravely in spite of the tears he could plainly see pooling in those blue eyes. The image warmed him as little else could in this place, and he allowed himself to feel that connection.

It hadn’t been severed after all when he left her in Winterfell. She’d been as broken as Bran when he’d left her sitting at their son’s bedside. Their boy had been unable to move or even wake, and Catelyn had been unable to move, either. Unable to rouse herself from the stupor of grief and guilt and desperation that kept her tethered to Bran’s sickbed. Broken. And he’d left her there. Alone. Fearing that the connection which bound them together more deeply than he’d ever dreamt possible had finally come up against something cruel enough to break it.

Yet, she had come to King’s Landing. He still marveled that she’d traveled all that way with only Ser Rodrik out of fear for him and their girls. Of course, she’d also grabbed an assassin’s Valyrian steel blade with her bare hands out of fear for their son. He’d known many brave men in his life, but none with courage greater than his wife’s.

He was glad she had come, he admitted to himself—not only to bring him warning of new threats, but to bring him herself. When she’d cried out upon seeing him and flung herself into his arms, he had known the connection was still there, still strong. When he held her in his arms and felt her heart beating against his, he had felt truly alive for the first time since leaving Winterfell. The miserable journey, the death of Sansa’s wolf by his own hand, the discord between his daughters, and the danger facing all of them had still loomed heavily over him, but he had felt far better able to face it knowing he didn’t face it quite so alone.

Sending her away was the most difficult thing he’d ever done, but even as he did so, he knew they could not be truly torn apart. The connection still held. _Love,_ he thought, silently naming the word that never came easily to his lips. _I love her, and in spite of all I’ve done to dishonor her, she loves me._ He’d taken strength from that knowledge as he’d suffered through the days and nights here in King’s Landing, trying to discern truth from falsehoods, and friends from foes. In the end, of course, he found had no friends here at all. He had endeavored to act honorably in all he’d done here, and to deal fairly with everyone regardless of his suspicions or his personal feelings toward them, yet he had found little enough honor in anyone in the Red Keep.

Only the woman he’d sent away, the one who’d taken at least half his heart with her, was worthy of honor. And he’d dishonored her by the cruelest lie he’d ever spoken. The lie he had lived for nearly fifteen years now. The lie he’d forced them all to live—not for honor, but for love. Love of his sister, love of the nephew who had to become a son in order for his life to be preserved. He’d abandoned his honor when he’d chosen that course, and through the years, he’d often thought the price far too high when he’d seen the sorrow and shame on Jon’s face, the hurt and anger on Catelyn’s. He’d vowed to never compromise his honor again.

 _And if the price of love was too great, what is the price of honor?_ he asked himself bitterly there in the dark. His leg throbbed and his head had a constant dull ache from lack of food and water. He found no comfort in thoughts of his children. Before his fifteenth name day, Robb led an army to war—steel in his hand instead of a wooden blade. Sansa was in the hands of the Lannisters, and Arya was missing. Bran had awakened, but would never again walk. Rickon would likely never remember him. _Jon,_ he thought. _I will see Jon again, at least._

Honor had brought him here, and that was a bitter pill indeed. It was honor that decreed he could neither accept Joffrey Baratheon on the throne nor accept the murders of Cersei Lannister’s children, bastards though they may be. He had thought to stand for justice, protect his children, and leave King’s Landing with his honor intact. _What a bloody fool you are, Eddard Stark!_ Honor had brought him here, and the price had proven far greater than he would willingly pay.

What he would do tomorrow had nothing to do with honor. He wouldn’t even try to lie to himself and think otherwise. As he had done all those years ago in the Tower of Joy, he would act solely for love. He would save his daughter, Sansa. He might save Arya, too, for surely she was not dead. She was a clever and resourceful child. Surely, she could be hidden away, and when she learned that she and her sister were to be sent home to Catelyn and Winterfell, she could reveal herself. He would save Robb as well, take the sword out of his hand and allow him to return to Winterfell where he could grow older and learn to be a true lord under Catelyn’s careful tutelage. She would counsel their son well, and Ned could only hope he would become a better man than his father. The two little boys would have their mother back to care for them and help them grow as well. If the gods were only good just this once, Ned could possibly give all five of the children their home and their mother. He could think of nothing better that remained to him to give them, and so he would stand up and speak the lies. He would give up the last shred of honor that remained to him for love of his children.

 _And what of Cat?_ That thought was bitter and almost too painful to contemplate. He drew strength even now from the image of her face, from the memory of her arms around him, from the certainty of her love for him as undeserved as it was. Yet those very things caused him pain beyond any he had ever felt, for tomorrow he would finally sever that connection, that invisible tether that held him to her, anchoring and strengthening him for so many years now. And she would feel the pain of it as deeply as he would. _She always pays the price for my sins._

Once he spoke the lies the Lannister woman would put in his mouth, he would take the oath of the Night’s Watch. That was their agreement. His children would be safe. His wife would have her children back. And he would have no wife or children any longer. He’d come to King’s Landing knowing that years would likely pass before he could go home, or before Catelyn could come to him once Robb was old enough to be the Stark in Winterfell in truth. Yet, he had held tightly to the idea that those years would pass, and that the connection between them was strong enough to weather the time apart—that they would come together finally, and put this separation behind them as they’d put other things that threatened to tear them apart behind them.

Now that would never be. Honor had brought him here. Love would compel him to lay down his honor and speak the lies that would free his children from the price of his mistakes. But he and Catelyn would pay it in full. He prayed that she could find it in her heart to forgive him and find joy in their children. For himself, he would find no joy again. He would say the words and go to the Wall and attempt to live the rest of his life as dutifully as he could, but it would not absolve him, and it would not bring him comfort.

 _Take no wife,_ the oath said. _Father no children._ Ned realized he was shaking as he thought about it. _Take no wife._ His lies and her shame and anger over them had not prevented the love that bound them together from taking root. Her lingering displeasure with Jon’s presence at Winterfell and his persistent guilt over taking his brother’s bride had not prevented it from growing ever stronger through the years. His leaving her there after Bran’s terrible fall had not been enough to sever it. It had never left them. Starks of Winterfell did not cry, but as he thought about what he must do on the morrow, Ned Stark felt a harsh sob rack his body. When the men took him from this cell on the morrow, he would voluntarily sever the bond between Catelyn and himself forever. And that was the price of honor.


	33. Wanton

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This ficlet was written in response to this prompt on tumblr: "Imagine your OTP lying next to each other in bed, staring at the ceiling, embarrassed and slightly alarmed by the wild, intense, filthy sex they just had."
> 
> So . . .this chapter most definitely earns the mature rating.

Catelyn lay on her back gasping for breath, too spent even to reach for the furs to cover her naked body. In truth, she remained more than warm enough without them, and it had little to do with the heat from the walls of her room.

She could hear Ned’s ragged breathing beside her and knew that he was likely sprawled on his back as well. She could feel his seed, hot and wet inside her, and her cheeks flushed crimson as she recalled what had they had just done. _He must think me no better than a whore!_ Unable to bear facing him, she kept her eyes fixed resolutely on the stone expanse of the ceiling above her, trying to understand what exactly had come over them.

She had found herself desiring her husband’s attentions with alarming frequency the past few weeks, and her desire had been a more insistent and powerful thing than she’d known before. Not that she hadn’t already accepted that bedding with her husband was something she found every bit as pleasurable as he did. Septa Mordane’s words about how it was a woman’s duty, and something a wife should tolerate in good grace in order to please her husband and bring him children had proven to be a far cry from anything Catelyn had discovered in the arms of Eddard Stark. Yet in these recent weeks, she had hungered for him as a starving man craves food, and while he had certainly not seemed displeased by that fact, she had wondered if there were something wrong with her—something shamefully wanton about her.

Then three days ago, she’d heard two of the maids giggling about Lord Eddard spending more time in his lady’s bed now that she was already with child than he’d even done before and wondering if he’d ever let the poor lady alone. Her face had grown hot at the thought that even the servants had noticed something different and the fact that they automatically laid it at Ned’s feet. _A lady does not behave like this,_ she’d thought miserably.

But as she’d turned to go back the way she’d come before they could discover her presence, she’d heard Old Nan’s unmistakable laughter. “That’s the wolf pup in her, you silly girl,” the old woman had cackled. “You’re too young to know anything, but just you wait until you carry a child of your own. Once you get over the sick of it, a babe in the belly can make you want a man in your bed more than just about anything. I’m quite certain Lady Catelyn’s not minding her husband’s attentions at all!” The old woman had laughed loudly then, and Catelyn had practically fled down the corridor to escape her embarrassment.

As she’d thought about it, though, she’d realized there might be some truth in Old Nan’s words. She was just past three moons with this new babe and no longer ill in the mornings. The terrible tiredness that had left her scarcely able to play with Robb had disappeared as well, and as her belly had only begun to swell noticeably to anyone other than herself _(and Ned, of course, when he’d run his hands over her naked middle)_ ,she didn’t yet feel ungainly and awkward.

Tonight, there had been more people present than usual in the Great Hall for the evening meal as a number of men from Torrhen’s Square had traveled to the Wolfswood for a hunt and were staying at Winterfell this night before leaving for home on the morrow. Ale had flowed liberally, and the dinner had gone on so late that Catelyn had sent little Robb to bed with a maidservant (and Ned had bid the woman take the bastard along as well) long before any of the men seemed ready to leave the Hall.

Ned had drunk more ale than usual, and when he’d rested his hand lightly on her thigh beneath the table as he so often did, he’d begun trailing his fingers up and down it. She’d nearly spilled her own drink at the sensation of his touch even through her heavy skirts, and he’d smiled at her rather smugly before turning to answer an inquiry from the man seated beside him. She’d put her own hand beneath the table then and firmly gripped his muscled thigh, enjoying the way he jumped slightly in surprise. He hadn’t turned away from his conversation, however, and she’d moved that hand until it brushed against the bulge made by his cock and balls. He’d coughed then, to cover up an exclamation, and she’d she smiled into her wine goblet, both exhilarated and shocked by her own boldness.

“My lady,” he’d said suddenly, rather loudly, and she’d drawn her hand back and looked up to meet his eyes which had gone the color of smoke and looked intently into hers. “I fear we keep you up too late. Forgive me.” He had not once taken his own hand from her thigh, and he turned to address the men seated nearest them. “Forgive me, my friends, but I have been remiss as a husband. As you know, my lady wife carries our second child now, and I should not keep her so long from her rest. Please continue to enjoy each other’s company here, but it is time I escort her to her chambers that she might sleep.”

Without waiting for any response, he’d stood and taken her hand. Suppressing her laughter, she’d risen, and the two of them had walked rather briskly from the Hall.

“I am not sleepy in the least, my lord,” she had whispered, once they were out in the courtyard.

“I had hoped you were not,” he’d replied, amusement and desire in his eyes. “Gods, Cat, I could not get you out of there quickly enough.”

Just inside the Great Keep, he’d actually pulled her to him and kissed her full on the mouth, which she could not recall his ever having done outside her room, but the boldness which had possessed her in the Hall remained, and she did not try to stop him. She’d found herself rather breathless when at last he released her and began to pull her toward her chambers.

“Robb,” she’d breathed. “I must look in on Robb.”

He’d nodded, and escorted her to the nursery where they’d discovered their son sleeping soundly. To Catelyn’s surprise, neither the maidservant nor the bastard were there. The boy did have a room assigned to him, but Robb liked having the wretched child with him and they normally shared the nursery.

Before Catelyn could wonder about his absence, the maidservant had come in. “Milord!” she’d said to Ned, who had bent to run a hand gently over Robb’s auburn curls after Catelyn had kissed him. “Wee Jon has had a night terror, I’m afraid, and he won’t settle at all. I took him to his room so he wouldn’t wake Little Lord Robb, but Jenny and I can’t do a thing with him!”

Ned had given Catelyn a tortured look but then had sighed and gone out with the maid. With a last look at her sweetly sleeping son, Catelyn had gone to her room alone, trying very hard not to resent Ned terribly for leaving her in order to care for another woman’s child. _Isn’t it enough that you left my bed in Riverrun and went to his mother’s? Must the brat take you from my bed as well?_

Alone in her chambers, she had fought with the laces of her dress as Ned was not there to help her with them, and she did not wish to call a maid. She’d gotten it off her and stood there angrily brushing out her hair—angry at Ned for not leaving the boy to the maids and angry at herself for still wanting him to come to her now.

He had come, entering her room without knocking, which he had never done. He’d come behind her as she stood before the looking glass in her shift and removed the brush from her hand to lay it on the dressing table without speaking. He’d then circled his arms around her waist and buried his face in her hair, his lips finding their way through the auburn lengths of it to the sensitive skin at the nape of her neck. She’d murmured at his touch and pressed herself back against him, catching her breath as she felt his cock through his breeches already stiff against her lower back at the crest of her hips.

“I need you,” he’d nearly growled, and she’d felt his arms release her only so that his hands could move to the task of undoing the laces of his breeches. His eyes remained on her even as he shed his clothing, and the hunger she saw in them made her feel hot and dizzy. She’d watched him undressing for only a brief moment before pulling her shift over her head and sliding her smallclothes to the floor.

“Come, my lord,” she’d whispered as she’d turned from him to walk to the bed.

As she’d reached it, he’d come up behind her, kissing her neck and pressing his body against hers from behind as he’d done before. Only now there were no garments between them, and her skin had felt set afire. He’d put a hand between her legs, and she’d realized how wet she was as his fingers slid in and around her sex. “Ned,” she’d gasped, and then he’d pushed her down onto the bed on all fours, mounting her as if he truly were a wolf, and she’d gasped more loudly when he’d pushed into her from behind.

He had thrust into her several times wildly as if he had lost all control of himself, and for a moment she’d thought he might come undone immediately. A part of her had thrilled to think that she could be the cause this uncharacteristic, almost savage behavior on his part, but another had devoutly wished for this not be over so quickly. Still, she hadn’t been able to prevent herself from pushing her hips back and up into his with every thrust, urging him on.

Suddenly, he’d pulled away from her, though, and she’d felt his hand on her waist, turning her over. His eyes had been wild, none of his usual reserve present in them at all, and her heart had raced even faster simply to look upon him in such a state. He’d looked at her as if she were his prey, and then his mouth was at her neck, her breasts, and finally between her legs where his tongue and lips tortured her in the sweetest way possible.

As much pleasure as she’d derived from that, she’d found herself wanting more, needing to touch more of him than she could reach, and almost without thought, she’d raised herself enough to push and pull at him, trying to get him to twist his body around to where she could grab at it. When he’d finally discerned what she’d wanted, he’d hesitated, looking up at her with a question in his eyes. She’d nodded at him, too breathless to speak and he had turned his body opposite to hers so that his thighs straddled her head and his cock was just above her face. He’d immediately buried his own face back between her legs, and she’d given an involuntary shudder as the sensation was subtly different as his tongue moved over her sex from above instead of below. Then she’d grasped his cock, finding it slick from having been inside her and brought it to her own lips.

She’d taken him in her mouth before, but never like this and never after he had already been inside her. He’d tasted of her, and the thought that he was tasting her even as she moved her tongue over him had made her feel shockingly wanton, but still made her even more desperate to have as much of him as she could. It had seemed to affect him as well, for he he normally held himself as still as possible when she pleasured him with her mouth, not wanting to choke or hurt her. This time, as he’d continued to lick at her, driving her ever closer to the edge, he’d been unable to keep his hips still, thrusting against her tongue and causing her to think at times she would not be able to breathe. Yet, she hadn’t wanted him to stop, and she’d dug her nails into his hips to hold him to her.

Finally, she’d felt that burst of heat starting in her sex and engulfing her entire body that she had come to know frequently in the arms of her lord husband, but this time the heat had been more intense and the waves of it had lasted longer than anything she could recall. She’d heard someone making a high pitched wailing sound as her body convulsed uncontrollably, and had realized vaguely it was her.

She’d not been certain of anything for a few blinding moments except for the intense waves of pleasure rolling through her entire body, but then she’d found herself looking up at Ned’s face. He’d been looking down at her as if he had never wanted anything more, and then she’d felt him lower himself onto her, and he was thrusting into her once more, this time as she lay on her back looking up into his face. It had taken only a moment for him lose himself, and she’d heard her quiet husband who would sometimes gasp audibly or breathe her name actually shout to the gods loudly enough that he could certainly be heard outside these chambers. As his seed filled her, she’d found herself lost once more to waves of her own pleasure.

He had rolled off her quickly after that, and now she lay here willing her heart rate to slow and wondering if her lord husband was as shocked by her wanton behavior as she was.

“Catelyn …” he said finally, his breathing still not entirely calm.

She turned her head slightly to see him lying upon his back, staring upward just as she had been. _He cannot look at me,_ she thought, feeling the crimson in her cheeks deepen at the thought. Stunned, she realized that her husband's cheeks had a faint pink color above his beard. _I have never seen Ned blush. He must truly be shocked._

“I’m sorry, my lord,” she said, just as he finally managed to say, “Forgive me, my lady.”

He turned to look at her then with concern on his face. “You have nothing to be sorry for, my love. I should never have treated you so shamefully.”

“I behaved shamefully,” she whispered. “You are my husband, and I would not have you …think me no better than a girl from a brothel.”

He sat up then, looking down at her incredulously. Ned had seen her naked any number of times now, and Catelyn had not been self-conscious of her nakedness with him in a long time, but she felt more than naked under that grey gaze. “A girl from a brothel?” he asked after a moment. Then he shook his head. “I must confess I know little enough about the variety of interactions which occur in brothels, my lady, but no one would ever confuse you with a woman who belonged in one. Least of all me.”

“But I …I”

“You accepted the advances of your husband in spite of his acting like a beast,” Ned said with a hint of bitterness, but she realized he was angry only at himself. “You should not be forced to do that, my lady.”

Now, she sat up. “No!” she said. “I wanted you!” She felt the heat rising in her cheeks yet again, but she’d rather him think her wanton than believe himself a monster. “You did nothing I did not want, my lord. I …I wanted you very much, Ned.”

She hated that she couldn’t hold his gaze, but she had to look down as she finished her shameful admission.

“I did not hurt you, Cat?” she heard him ask, gently and earnestly.

“No, my lord,” she whispered, still looking down.

He reached a hand out to touch her beneath her chin and raise her eyes to his. “Truly?”

She looked at him. “Truly.” She bit her lip. “Did I not …shock you? I would not have you think ill of me or find me …” She looked down again, unable to finish the sentence.

“I find you beautiful.”

She looked up at him quickly, not certain she’d heard him correctly.

“I find you beautiful, Cat,” he repeated. “Never more so than when you give yourself to me and allow me to give you pleasure as well. To watch you lose yourself …” He swallowed, and her heart skipped a beat, remembering how much she had enjoyed watching him. “It is a privilege, my lady, to know you in such moments, and I would never have you feel shame in that.”

“So I did not shock you?”

He laughed then. “You …surprised me.” He grinned at her. “I nearly died when you grabbed me under the table tonight.”

She laughed even as she blushed once more.

“But your desiring me is ever a welcome surprise, my lady. You needn’t ever concern yourself about that. And you most certainly should never doubt that I shall ever desire you.”

She smiled at him gratefully, and he pulled her to him as he lay back down, this time tucking his arm around her and having her rest her head on his chest. “So …you liked it?” she asked shyly against the skin of his chest.

“Liked it?” he said, and she felt his chest shaking beneath her. “I assure you, my lady, I have never, ever felt anything quite so wonderful. I liked it indeed.”

Catelyn gave a small, satisfied sigh, thinking that perhaps Septa Mordane had been even more wrong about matters between man and wife than she had already suspected. She couldn’t even be angry at him for going to tend to the bastard before coming to her room anymore. _He would have done the same for Robb,_ she told herself, knowing it to be true.

The thought of the bastard, as always, brought with it the fleeting, painful thought of his mother—the woman Ned had loved.

_I assure, you my lady, I have never, ever felt anything quite so wonderful._

Catelyn smiled against her husband’s warm skin, allowing those words to banish that particular ghost from her bed on this night. Whatever she had been to Ned, she had never made him feel as Catelyn had tonight, or her husband would not have said those words. Eddard Stark did not give false praise.

“Ned?” she said sleepily.

“Hmm?”

“I never felt anything so wonderful, either.”

His low pitched rumbling laugh thrilled her heart as much as his touch had thrilled her body. “Well then, my lady,” he said, placing a hand tenderly on her belly as he had done so frequently since learning she was with child, “Since we are in accord on that, I think it likely that Robb and this little one will have no shortage of siblings once we’ve been given enough time.”

Holding onto those words like a promise, Catelyn Stark fell asleep with a full heart.


	34. A Small Celebration for Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This little drabble was written for this tumblr prompt: Ned/Cat- "Hey, have you seen the…? Oh.”
> 
> A little scene in a modern AU

“Ned?”

Catelyn Stark tossed her purse down on the table in the entryway feeling slightly alarmed by the silence. Her house was never silent.

“Kids?” she called as she stuck her head into the empty family room. Not one Stark child or any of the assorted other children who always seemed to congregate here occupied any of the sofas or chairs. The floor space in front of the television was empty, and the xbox was turned off.

She was quite certain Robb’s car had been in the driveway, and she’d pulled hers in beside Ned’s in the garage. Where was everybody?

“Robb? Sansa?” she called out, walking toward the foot of the stairs. “Arya! Rickon! Bran!” she yelled up toward their bedrooms.

She was just about to start panicking when her husband’s voice called out from the kitchen. “In here, Cat!”

A bit annoyed with him for not answering her before then, she walked into the kitchen to see him standing in the doorway between the kitchen and dining room, smiling at her as if all was right in the world.

“Hey,” she said. “Have you seen the …? Oh.” Her hands went to her mouth, and she stood there speechless, for as she’d spoken, her husband had moved out of the doorway so that she could see behind him.

The table was set for only two people, and candles burned brightly. Two glasses of wine were already poured and waiting. She realized then that something smelled quite wonderful in the kitchen. She hadn’t even noticed it in her preoccupation over her apparently missing family.

“Have I seen what?” Ned asked her with a hint of amusement in his voice, as he came to stand beside her and kiss her on the cheek.

“What? Oh. The children. I …what is this, Ned?”

He chuckled. “This is dinner, my love. Yes, I’ve seen our children. Robb is at Theon’s. Jon picked him up. They’re dropping Sansa at Margaery’s on the way there. My sister has the other three for the night. They’re all out for the entire night.”

“But …” She struggled to make sense of it. “It isn’t our anniversary,” she said rather stupidly.

He laughed. “No. And it isn’t your birthday or Valentine’s Day, either. Now, we have about ten minutes before I need to get our dinner out of that oven, so come have a glass of wine with me.”

Stunned, she allowed him to lead her into the dining room where he held out her chair as if they were at a fancy restaurant. As she sat down, he handed her her glass and sat down beside her to lift his own.

“So …what is today, Ned?” she asked him.

“Today is just like any other day, Cat. Which means it is a day on which I love my beautiful wife more than I can tell her.” He looked almost embarrassed. “I don’t tell you that often enough. I thought perhaps, it was high time I showed you.”

She raised her glass to his, but also raised her brow. “For no reason at all?” she asked him.

“Well …I did manage to get all the kids out of the house, and I did cook you dinner. So …I confess that I might possibly be trying to get into your pants, Mrs. Stark.”

She laughed out loud then, and clinked her glass against his before taking a sip, still slightly off balance but thoroughly delighted that her husband, who was hardly known for spontaneous romantic displays, had done all this for her.

They sat in comfortable silence for a few moments, simply looking at each other over their wineglasses, and then he leaned over to kiss her briefly before standing up to go back into the kitchen. As he walked behind her chair, she reached up and grabbed his hand.

“Oh, Mr. Stark,” she said.

He raised a brow in question, and she tugged on him to bring his ear down to her lips so she could whisper very softly, “About getting into my pants? Well …where you’re concerned, I’m pretty much a sure thing.”


	35. Rainy Day Troubles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This little story was written for the tumblr prompt: "There's something I've been meaning to say..." 
> 
> It takes place at Winterfell during a very long and trying day of cold rain and disobedient children.

It had been a long, foul day. A bitterly cold rain had been falling upon Winterfell since dawn, and the children had been confined within the Great Keep without any release for their seemingly boundless energy. Catelyn had done her best to to keep them entertained and reasonably well behaved, and had succeeded somewhat with Sansa and little Bran. Four year old Arya had been a bit of a trial, but as she was still small enough for Catelyn to allow her to bounce around and even run a bit in the warm, roomy chambers the Lady of Winterfell called her own, she had not been unmanageable. She’d even spent one hour fascinated by the brushes and other items on Catelyn’s dressing table which had rather shocked Catelyn as the child expressed no interest in such things normally. Of course, when Catelyn had suggested they might use one of the brushes on Arya’s own hair, she’d bounced away immediately.

All in all, the younger three had all been manageable, spending most of the day listening more or less attentively to stories told by herself or Old Nan, and playing games or singing songs and causing her to smile at least as often as to sigh in exasperation over the weather which kept them all confined.

Robb and the bastard had been another matter, and the Greyjoy boy had not helped in the least. Two boys of nearly nine could be goaded into all manner of mischief by a boy just old enough to think he was nearly a man, and today had been proof enough of that.

They’d gone out twice after being expressly forbidden to do so and tracked mud everywhere upon their return. During their second excursion, they’d managed to find a frog which they’d set upon Septa Mordane, frightening the woman half out of her wits. In truth, Catelyn felt the Septa had overreacted to the presence of a tiny amphibian, but that did not change that what the boys had done was cruel. They’d intended to frighten her and they’d succeeded. Young Theon had actually accepted the blame for that, much to her surprise, standing before her to confess his crime, and so had been banished to his room for the remainder of the day.

She’d hoped Robb and the other boy would settle down after that, but unfortunately that had not been the case. They’d taken to fighting with wooden swords in the nursery and had managed to knock down an entire shelf of Sansa’s dolls—one of which was an expensive and beautiful porcelain doll Catelyn’s father had sent her from Riverrun on her fifth name day. It had shattered beyond repair.

Catelyn had easily heard Sansa’s howl of grief and rage from her own chambers where she’d been coaxing Bran (successfully) and Arya (not successfully at all) to lie down and rest a bit before the evening meal. When she’d rushed to the nursery, fearing some injury had occurred, she had seen her six year old daughter crying over the broken pieces of the doll while the two boys looked on with guilt and fear on their faces.

Something had snapped. She honestly couldn’t recall all she had said to the two boys, only that she had screamed at both of them. Robb had all but fallen to his knees, crying and repeating, “I’m sorry, Mother. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry, Sansa,” over and over.

Jon Snow, however, had remained silent, simply staring at the broken pieces of porcelain as if trying to understand how they had gotten there. He did not look at her.

“Look at me, Jon Snow!” she had finally snapped, and the boy had looked up at her then, gazing at her with Ned’s grey eyes. She saw guilt in them and possibly fear, but he remained silent, and his silence infuriated her. “Have you nothing to say?” she asked him.

Still he looked at her with those grey eyes, far too much like Ned’s. _Why is he here?_ she thought furiously. _Without him, Robb would have no one to fight with in the nursery. Without him, the doll would not have broken._

“Get out,” she said to him. “Get out and go to your own room. You have no place here.”

She heard a sharp intake of breath and looked up to see her husband standing in the doorway. His clothing was soaked through as if he had only just come inside, and she thought that even he must feel chilled standing there dripping so, but he did not shiver. He stared at her with an unreadable expression on his face, and his eyes looked colder than she had seen them in a long time.

“Go to your room, Jon, as Lady Stark has told you,” he said softly. “You go to your room as well,   
Robb, and remain there until I come.”

He went to Sansa then, who still sat on the floor with her broken doll, sniffling. “It’s my princess, Father! From Grandfather Tully, and Robb and Jon broke her!” she wailed.

“I can see that,” he said gently, kneeling down beside her. “I fear she cannot be mended, Sansa,” he told her as he picked up several of the pieces. “Your brothers shall both apologize to you, and they will be punished for what they have done. Perhaps if we write to your grandfather of how much you loved the doll he gave you and what has happened to it, he will help me find you another.”

“I don’t want another one! I want my princess back!” she wailed.

Ned looked rather at a loss then, and Catelyn forced herself to move. “Come, Sansa,” she said. “Let’s go to your room, sweetling. I know you are upset, but we cannot change what has happened. Come, and I will stay with you awhile.”

Reluctantly, the little girl left her broken doll on the floor and came to stand beside her. As Catelyn started to lead her out, Ned called after her. “I know she cannot be replaced, Sansa, but I will get you another doll.”

“Thank you, Father,” she said quietly.

“My lady,” Ned said, looking up from Sansa to Catelyn. “I will speak with you when I’ve dealt with the boys.”

“Yes, my lord,” she’d said, and she’d taken their daughter out.

It had taken some time to settle Sansa down, but at last her elder daughter had allowed her to return to her chambers to fetch Arya. Catelyn had explained to Arya what had happened, and the younger girl was surprisingly sympathetic. She’d run immediately to her sister, when Catelyn had brought her to the room and offered to smack Robb and Jon both. Catelyn hadn’t even corrected her. She’d left the girls there with promises to send someone for them when it was time for the evening meal, and then she’d gone back to her chambers to collect the sleeping Bran and carry him to the nursery, as he was the only one of the children who still slept there. She noted that the broken pieces of Sansa’s doll had been cleared away and realized Ned must have done that. Then she went back to her chambers to await her lord husband.

 _I will speak with you when I’ve dealt with the boys._ The boys. Always he spoke of them as such. As if there was no difference between his trueborn heir and his bastard. Never did she speak of the bastard at all. Questions about him were forbidden and her opinions on his presence here were unwelcome. Most days, she had learned to accept that with remarkably little bitterness considering how she had felt when she’d first learned that the boy was to be raised with her own children. But her life here was far too sweet in most ways to let bitterness over her husband’s bastard poison it.

She cared deeply for her children and her husband, and she knew he cared for her, even if she could not replace the unknown woman—the boy’s mother—in his heart. Yet, she now feared what he would say to her. He had obviously heard her shouting at the boy, and he had looked so cold.

When he came to her after more than an hour, he had changed his clothes and his hair had dried. He knocked on her door as he ever did, and entered only when she bid him come in.

“The boys will remain in their rooms the rest of today and tomorrow,” he said by way of greeting. “They are not to receive anything to eat tonight. Mayhap going to bed on an empty stomach will cause them to think upon their behavior today.”

She nodded. “Very well, my lord.” She bit her lip then, but could not help but ask, “Are you warm now, my lord? I see you have changed out of your wet things. You looked as if you’d been underwater.”

He snorted. “I felt as if I’d been underwater. You know I was to spend the morning in the armory to discuss the current state of weapons and armor for our men with Jory. While we were there, we received word the heavy rains had caused a section of thatch on the newer part of the stable roof to give way, and we’ve been attempting to make what repairs we could to it. Not easy in this downpour, I can tell you.”

She walked to him then, intending to put her hand on his arm or shoulder and offer him some comfort. It came naturally to her, anymore—this desire to comfort him. But he stiffened slightly, and moved away from her now, and she felt a lump come to her throat. _He is angry with me,_ she thought. _He is angry for what I said to Jon Snow. I reprimanded our own son as well! And the boy would not even apologize!_

She took a deep breath, and stood up straight to face him. “You said you would speak with me, my lord,” she said firmly, hoping that there was no tremor in her voice. “What did you wish to speak about?”

She saw the tightening of his jaw as he met her eyes. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to say …”

He sounded so very serious that it worried her. Would he truly berate her for reprimanding the boy when he deserved it? Had she displeased him in some other way? He certainly looked unhappy. She bit her lip and waited for him to continue.

“I have been unfair to you, Catelyn,” he finally said.

She had not expected that. “My lord?” she asked.

“We have four children now, and they are entirely your responsibility. You also manage this entire castle and assist me in any number of ways. I do not assist you enough.”

She still had difficulty believing what she heard. “Care of babes is not the province of the Lord of the Winterfell,” she assured him. “That is my duty, my lord, and I do not mind it.”

“Jon is not your duty,” he said almost too quietly to be heard. “He is my responsibility. And Robb is old enough now that I should take him with me more. He will be Lord of Winterfell one day, and he is not too young to learn what that means.”

She waited silently for him to say more.

He came to her then and took her hands. “I would have you treated as you deserve, Cat,” he said earnestly. “By myself, and by my …children.” He stumbled over the last word, and Catelyn knew he thought of Jon Snow as well as their own children., “I would have everyone here give you the respect you deserve, my lady. And I want always to do so myself.”

He had not been angry with her after all, she realized. He had been angry at himself. He would never change his position when it came to Jon Snow. She knew that. For whatever reason (and she chose not to speculate on his reasons too closely as that brought nothing but pain), he believed it his duty to keep the boy with him. Yet, he was not entirely blind to what that cost her. In his own way, he was telling her that. This, she realized, was as close to an apology for Jon Snow as she was ever likely to get.

“You have always given me respect, my love,” she said softly, and in his eyes, she saw guilt and doubt, but she saw something else, too. “You have given me much more,” she assured him, moving even closer.

He let go of her hands then to put his arms around her. “I would spare you any pain I could. I hope you know that.”

“I do.” She reached up to kiss him then, and as he returned the kiss, she could feel the things he could not say. She knew how difficult words could be for her taciturn husband, and she cherished those he’d just spoken to her. Even more, she cherished this feeling now. Because in moments like this one, she didn’t need words to understand that she was loved. She didn’t know all of Ned’s secrets. She didn’t know why he had to hold some things so deeply inside that she could not share them. But she did know she was loved.

“I will get Sansa another doll,” he said when they finally broke the kiss.

“I know,” she said. “You never cease trying to fix our hurts, my love.”

He smiled at her then, and she felt warm all over.

“We should probably go collect Bran and the girls,” she told him, “and see if we can make it to the Great Hall without drowning.”

He laughed. “Well, my lady, if we do manage not to drown, you still will no doubt be chilled to the bone. I would be most happy to come back here and warm you upon our return.”

She felt the slight flush in her cheeks. “And I would be most happy to let you, my lord,” she said as he turned to get her cloak. As he slipped it over her shoulders as he had a thousand times, all felt easy between them once more, and Catelyn thought that even the Northern rain could not chill her now.


	36. This One's On Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This little ficlet is in response to the tumblr prompt: Could you please do "This one's on me" for Ned/Cat? 
> 
> As if meeting a very drunken Robert at a bar isn't already painful enough, Ned walks in to find his brother's beautiful ex-girlfriend there as well. 
> 
> Modern AU

He almost turned around and walked right out of the bar when he saw her. He couldn’t imagine she’d want to see anyone with the last name Stark right now. She deserved a shot at happiness without Brandon or any reminders of him interfering with that.

“Ned!” Robert Baratheon’s booming voice called out loudly from the other side of the room. “Ned Stark! Get your ass over here! I thought you were standing us up!”

Ned sighed. No escaping now. “Now you know I wouldn’t do a thing like that, Robert,” he said as he approached his friend’s table, plastering a fake smile on his face. The truth is that even before he’d seen Catelyn Tully sitting at the bar with some guy he didn’t know, he’d not been looking forward to this. He didn’t actually like bars all that much. Flirting with strangers was not in his skill set, drinking until he passed out didn’t appeal to him, and sitting around watching his friends do both of those things got old pretty quickly.

He sat down beside his best friend who appeared to have already had quite a few drinks and was introduced to the three girls sitting with him.

“The blonde’s good to go, I think,” Robert leaned over and whispered. “I’ll let you have her if you want. God knows you haven’t gotten laid in far too long.”

Of course, his drunken whisper was loud enough for all three girls to hear. The blonde in question giggled drunkenly, but the other two looked thoroughly annoyed, and Ned simply wanted to fall through the floor. “I’m going to get a drink,” he mumbled. “Anybody else need a drink?”

Nobody raised their hand except Robert, and Ned didn’t think he needed anymore, so he stood up to go to the bar and get himself something, remembering halfway there that Catelyn Tully was seated at the bar.

Maybe, she was gone. Nope. There she sat—that unbelievably gorgeous hair of hers falling down her back. Maybe she wouldn’t see him.

“Can I help you?” the bartender said to him as he leaned against the bar, trying not to face in Catelyn’s direction.

“Um, do you have Maker’s Mark? A Maker’s and coke, then.”

“Hi, Ned.”

The soft voice went right through him. He turned to see her looking up at him from where she sat, several seats down the bar. He noticed the seat next to her was empty now.

“Hello, Catelyn,” he said.

She laughed. “Am I ever going to get you to call me Cat?”

He swallowed. Even her laugh was beautiful. His brother was a fucking idiot.

“I …it’s good to see you,” he said. “You look …good.” _You look beautiful. Just like you always do._

She laughed again, but this time he thought it had a bitter edge to it. “Yeah? Well thanks. It’s good to know someone thinks so.”

He must have looked shocked at her words because she bit her lip and shook her head. “I’m sorry, Ned. Don’t mind me. It’s just …well, it’s not your problem, really. I’m sorry.”

“No,” he said. “Don’t be sorry.” Without thinking about it, he was picking up his bourbon drink and moving to sit in the empty seat beside her. “Are you okay, Catelyn?” he asked.

She gave him a look.

“Cat,” he corrected. “Are you okay, Cat?”

“Yeah,” she said, sighing. “I’m okay. It just looks like I’ve been dumped.”

For a moment, he thought she was talking about Brandon, but they’d broken up three months ago once Catelyn finally caught him with one of his other girls. Then he remembered that this seat had not been empty when he’d come in.

“The guy who was here?” he asked slowly.

“Ah. So you did see me when you came in.”

“I . .um, yeah. I didn’t think you’d want to see me. I mean, after Brandon and everything. And I didn’t realize you saw me so I just …”

She smiled a little. “Everybody in here heard Robert yell your name. I only know one Ned Stark.” She looked at him more seriously. “And you aren’t Brandon. You were never anything but nice to me, Ned. Why wouldn’t I want to see you?”

“I just wanted to let you enjoy your evening.”

She laughed louder than ever at that. “I’m sorry,” she said when she finally stopped laughing. “It’s just …there was never a chance I was going to enjoy this evening. I don’t know why I agreed to it. Well …yes, I do. I agreed to it so my sister would leave me alone. She’s been trying to set me up with this guy she thinks is perfect for me since Brandon and I broke up, and let’s just say her taste in men isn’t anything like mine.”

“Oh. Blind date? God, those suck.”

“Don’t they?” she sipped her drink, and Ned noticed it was almost empty. “Lysa knows I don’t even like bars, so I should have said no as soon as she told me he wanted to meet me here! He’s had three drinks already, has talked incessantly about his amazing college football career, his workout routine that keeps his body as hard as steel, and how his very hot ex-girlfriend just couldn’t handle all the attention he got from women when they went out.”

“Wow,” Ned said. “I was going to tell you about the awful date Robert set up on once, but I think you win.”

She laughed again, and Ned thought it was about the loveliest sound imaginable. “Anyway,“ she continued, “I don’t think I managed to fake enough interest in his monologue because he certainly lost interest in me quickly. He said he was going out to smoke right after Robert yelled for you, and I haven’t seen him since.”

“Have you looked very hard?” he asked her with a grin.

“No,” she admitted. “I kind of decided if he wasn’t back by the time I finished this drink, I’d hit the road.”

That drink was really close to being empty, and Ned realized he didn’t want her to leave. “I don’t think I’m going back over there with Robert, either,” he said. “He’s got some drunk blonde ready to do whatever he wants, and he actually sort of offered her to me while ago. That’s really …”

“That’s really a dick sort of move,” she finished for him.

“Yeah. It is.” He looked back over to where Robert sat with the blonde draped over him. The other two girls had left. “Damn,” he said.

“What?”

“I was kind of hoping her friends would get her away from him. But maybe they weren’t even with her. I don’t know. Anyway, it looks like I’m stuck here until Robert’s ready for a cab because I can’t let her leave with him. She’s too drunk to know what she’s doing. And so is he.”

Catelyn looked at him for a long moment. “You honestly mean what you just said. I can tell. You aren’t just saying that to impress me or to look like a good guy.” She shook her head. “Are you sure you’re Brandon’s brother?”

“All my life. I followed him around like a puppy when I was little.”

“Oh, Ned, I’m sorry! That was really thoughtless of me. I shouldn’t bash your brother to you. It isn’t fair!”

Ned shrugged. “What he did to you wasn’t fair, Cat.” It startled him to realize how easily her nickname came to his lips then. “I love my brother, and I always will. And I’ll defend him to most people. But not to you. You get a free pass to say what you want about Brandon. You’ve earned it.”

She laughed again. “I’ve missed you,” she said, and Ned felt his breath catch. “I mean, I know that sounds silly,” she said. “We hardly ever talked, and I guess I don’t even really know you that well, but …” She shrugged now. “Like I said, you were always nice to me. And when you do talk, you have so much more to say than most. And you’re funny. Brandon always laughed at me when I said that, but you are! You’re just quiet about it.”

He smiled. “Well …I’ve been told I’m quiet about pretty much everything.” He looked back at Robert’s table. Two new girls had joined him and the blonde as well as another guy. It didn’t look like Ned was being missed much. “Looks like my babysitting duty isn’t going to end soon,” he muttered. Then he looked back at Catelyn. “For what it’s worth, I’ve missed you, too.” The words were out before he could stop them, and he almost held his breath until she spoke again.

“Really?” she asked him.

“Really,” he said, and they just smiled at each other for a few moments.

“You know,” she said, finally, “I’d hate to make you stay here on Robert-sitting duty all by your lonesome. Would you like some backup?”

“I’d love that,” he said, knowing he sounded entirely too eager, but unable to say anything else.

“Well, Ned, if I’m going to stick around this place, I’ll need another drink,” she said with a smile, raising her hand to flag down the bartender.

He reached out and took her hand to lower it back to the bar, leaving his hand resting over it as he used his other hand to wave toward the bartender. When the man nodded, indicating that he’d be right there, he smiled at Cat. “This one’s on me.”


	37. Pictures of You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was written for the tumblr prompt: How about Jon Snow and Lyanna Stark, and "I think you missed your calling" :)
> 
> This is the first fic I ever wrote where neither Ned nor Catelyn appears. It's a modern AU where Lyanna Stark lives to see her son grow up, and Jon ponders what his mother’s choices have meant for his life and hers.

Of all the things Jon had imagined doing tonight, getting drunk with his mother was not one of them. Yet as he set his third empty beer bottle down on the patio table, he realized that’s exactly what he was doing. 

“You need another one?” she asked, taking a drag off her cigarette and looking more relaxed than she had since she’d arrived at Winterfell early this afternoon.

“Maybe I ought to slow down. I drank those pretty fast.”

“You haven’t had more than three beers in an hour at that college Ned sends you to?” she asked him, tilting her head to the side and smiling. “Come on. You can tell me about it. I’m your mother.”

“Well . . .” He was only nineteen and just back from his freshman year, still nearly two years from being able to drink legally. Did normal people discuss their really wild college nights with their mothers? Did normal mothers ask about them? He couldn’t imagine Aunt Cat asking Robb to share the story of the night he’d passed out naked and Smalljon Umber had carried him out and left him lying by the fountain in front of the freshman girls’ dorm. Jon smiled at the memory. He’d had some bad nights himself, but none to rival that one. “Yeah,” he said. “We’ve drunk our share of beer. And done some pretty stupid stuff.”

“By ‘we,’ surely you don’t mean to include Robb Stark, golden boy, pride of the Stark family, and perpetual Eagle Scout?” his mother asked in mock disbelief.

Jon frowned at her. Sometimes his mother’s sarcasm annoyed him. Robb was a really good guy. So everyone liked him, and his parents were proud of him. That didn’t make him an asshole. It just made him luckier than most people. “Yeah, I mean Robb,” he said. “And don’t talk about him like he’s some kind of dick. He is your nephew, and he’s never done anything to you.”

She rolled her eyes. “Sorry. I meant no offense to your favorite brother.”

_God. Not again._ “Robb’s my cousin, Mom,” he said flatly. “I know he’s not my brother. But he is my best friend.” He sighed and then tried to lighten the conversation. “And he never was an Eagle Scout, you know. Too busy with his sports for scouting.”

Shrugging, she crushed her cigarette out and dropped it into an empty beer bottle. “I don’t know why your aunt and uncle don’t have any ashtrays out here,” she said.

“Because they don’t smoke?” he said, looking at her in amusement. “And they’ve threatened to kill any of us that they catch trying it?” He shook his head at her. “You told Uncle Ned you’d quit.”

She shrugged again. “I always tell him I’ve quit. He never believes me. And since they don’t allow any smoking in the house, the least they could do is put ashtrays out here. I can’t be the only person they know who smokes.” She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes with a sigh. “Well, I want another beer whether you do or not. Be a good boy and get your mother a drink.”

Jon stood up and started for the patio door. 

“Oh, no. Not from in there. From my cooler in the back of my car.” She jerked her head sideways in the direction of the driveway curving around the side of the house.

Jon laughed. “Is that where these came from?” he asked her, indicating the six bottles they’d just split between them.

“Yep.”

“You do know there’s a full bar and a fridge full of beer just inside that door, right?”

“Yep. And I know Eddard undoubtedly knows the level in every liquor bottle and the precise count on those beers.”

Jon suppressed a smile at the exaggerated, snobby, proper tone of voice his mother used when speaking his uncle’s full name, but he felt compelled to defend him all the same. “Uncle Ned is not nearly as stuffy as you make him out to be.”

“No,” she said, her voice losing its edge entirely. “He isn’t. But he has four teenagers in this house now, and he did grow up with me and Brandon.” She laughed. “I’m quite certain Sansa wouldn’t think of sneaking liquor. That girl is her mother made over, and I doubt Catelyn Tully ever broke a rule in her life. But you and Robb are not above suspicion, and Arya . . .” She grinned at him. “That one’s going to give them a run for their money!”

“Arya’s fourteen!” Jon protested.

His mother grinned more widely. “Ask your uncle what I was doing at fourteen.”

Jon shook his head, thinking that he likely didn’t want to know. After all, at seventeen, she’d started an affair with a married man and eighteen got pregnant with him.

“I’ll get us some beers from your car,” he said and turned to walk through the dark backyard to the driveway.

It must be after midnight. Robb was out of town at some baseball workshop. He’d played well for a freshman this spring and was hoping to start varsity when they went back to school sophomore year. Sansa had gone to bed early because she was spending her summer babysitting three little kids while their parents worked, and she had to be up at 6:30. Uncle Ned and Aunt Cat had chased the other three to bed when Rickon had fallen asleep on the couch and excused themselves not long after telling Jon and Lyanna they both had to work the next day.

Of course, they’d actually gone up to bed to give him time alone with his mother. Jon knew that well enough. He’d lived with them full time since he was twelve, and he’d been dumped on them for weeks on end whenever his mother had gone off touring with the latest band that was going to catapult her to stardom even before that. They’d had a bigger role in raising him than Lyanna Stark ever had, and they knew it. Yet, they’d always been careful to acknowledge Lyanna as his mother. 

It had been easier for Uncle Ned, he supposed. Jon didn’t have a dad, after all. That asshole Rhaegar Targaryen had been more than happy to fuck a starstruck teenaged girl and fill her head full of dreams about how they’d be famous with her singing and his guitar playing. They sure as hell didn’t need to worry about little things like his having a wife and two kids or her still being in high school. As soon as she turned eighteen, his mother had dropped out of high school and run away with that motherfucker without leaving so much as a note for her family. No one heard from her for more than a year, and then she’d come home with a two month old baby and no explanations. She hadn’t even known that her father and her older brother Brandon had died in a car crash two months after she’d left or that Uncle Ned had gotten married and had a kid until her return.

Uncle Ned hadn’t turned her away. He’d admitted to Jon that it had taken him a long time to forgive her, but he couldn’t just turn her away. Slowly, Lyanna had told him most of what had occurred during her time away, including the fact that Rhaegar the dick had refused to divorce his wife and suggested she have an abortion when she got pregnant. Sometimes Jon wondered if her life wouldn’t have been happier if she had. Anyway, by the time Jon was two or three, she’d gotten restless again and moved out. They’d gone from one little apartment to another as she’d joined different bands and chased the pop stardom she hadn’t been ready to give up on--simply leaving him at Winterfell when he became inconvenient and finally giving in to his demands by age twelve that she just let him live there in peace.

So Uncle Ned had always been his father, even if he could never call him that. There was no confusion there. No toes to step on. He even looked more like Uncle Ned than any of his cousins did, except maybe Arya. He used to worry that it bothered Aunt Cat when people thought he was Uncle Ned’s kid, but he didn’t worry about that anymore. He understood her better now that he was older, and realized that the hesitance she’d sometimes shown to embrace him as fully as Uncle Ned had little to do with him personally and everything to do with the fact that he did have a mother.

Aunt Cat was everything a mother was supposed to be. Lyanna Stark wasn’t. Not really. But she was his mother, and Jon loved her. In spite of everything, he loved her. And no one had understood that better than Aunt Cat, and she’d bent over backwards trying to be certain he knew that she wasn’t trying to take his mother’s place. His aunt and his mother had never been close. They were very different women. He couldn’t imagine his aunt ever walking away from her family for any reason regardless of what she wanted for herself, and he couldn’t imagine his mother remaining in one place her whole life regardless of how much she loved her family without simply suffocating. He didn’t fault either of them for being who they were. He just wished they could each be a little more understanding of the other.

“I’m thirsty, Jon! Did you get lost?” His mother’s voice from the patio made him jump, and he realized he’d been leaning on her car lost in thoughts about his assorted parents. 

_Get it together,_ he told himself, shaking his head. _She’ll probably only stay a few days, and then she’ll be gone again and you can go back to bonding via text message._ That was easier somehow.

He opened the door and saw the cooler in the backseat. Beside it lay what look like a big notebook. Curious, he picked it up and realized it was a sketchbook. He opened it and gasped at the first image he saw in the light from the open car door. The black and white drawing of a three year old boy’s face pressed up against a window, an expression of sorrow and betrayal on his face, was breathtaking. It was also heartbreakingly recognizable as his own face. He began flipping through the pages, unable to take his eyes from the images.

“Hey? Did you get lost? I thought you . . .Oh.” 

He looked up to see his mother standing beside him, staring at the sketchbook in his hand. 

“I didn’t realize I’d left that in the car,” she said quietly.

“These . . .these are incredible,” he said, his voice sounding kind of hoarse.

“It’s just something I started doing about a year back,” she said. “Here, I’ll put it . . .”

“No,” Jon said as she reached for it. “I haven’t finished looking at it.”

She sighed. “Okay. Take it back with you. I’ll get the beer.”

He didn’t stop on the patio, instead going all the way back inside to the large family room through the patio door. He laid the sketchbook on the pool table under the light and began to look at the pictures. They were all portraits. Most were of him at all different ages. Some were of his cousins, and a few were of his uncle and even his aunt. He even recognized a couple of his grandfather Rickard and his Uncle Brandon from having seen old photographs. But none of these sketches were done from photographs. These people were caught in ordinary moments doing simple things or even nothing at all. But every face gave some hint of what that person was feeling or thinking, or sometimes a hint that the person was trying not to give away their thoughts. 

He’d almost forgotten his mother was with him until he heard the knock on the patio door. He turned around to see her through the glass with her arms full of beer bottles and no free hands to work the door knob. He went to let her in, and she went immediately to set the beers on the bar and opened one for each of them.

He took it from her and went back to the sketchbook. “These are incredible, Mom.”

“You said that already.”

“I don’t know what else to say.” He looked at her. “I didn’t even know you could draw.”

She shrugged. “I was pretty good at art in school. I liked it a lot, too. But it was always my voice that got the attention.”

“Well, you are a hell of a singer.”

She grinned at him. “I am,” she agreed. “Damn shame the world at large will never know it.” She turned up her bottle and downed nearly half of it in one swig.

“Mom . . .I’m sorry that . . .”

“Don’t worry about it, Jon. I long ago accepted that I’m not destined for superstardom. I was being funny.”

Jon looked back at the sketchbook, opened now to a drawing done the Christmas Lyanna had brought all the kids puppies because the guy she’d been dating bred Siberian Huskies. Rickon was around three then, Jon guessed, and he was sitting in the floor in the center of the page, looking apprehensive as Shaggydog leapt up and licked his face. Sansa, Arya, and Bran were behind Rickon with perfect expressions of joy and and excitement as their pups jumped around at their feet. 

“I’d forgotten how small they were then,” he said.

“Your cousins or the dogs?” his mother asked him, smiling.

He laughed. “Both, I guess.” He turned around. “It’s exactly right,” he said, looking at her. “How did you do that?”

She shrugged. “I just remember it. You and Robb aren’t in the picture because you were old enough to realize that my giving you the puppies didn’t guarantee your getting to keep them. So you . . .”

“We were in the kitchen!” Jon laughed, remembering. “Aunt Cat looked like she was going to die or kill you when you brought all those puppies in, and Uncle Ned just went all quiet. And when they went into the kitchen, we knew we had to get to them before they decided how to tell us no!”

Lyanna Stark laughed then, a great big heartfelt laugh with no bitterness and no sarcasm, and Jon marveled to see just how young his mother could look when she laughed. She wasn’t yet forty, and she was three years younger than Aunt Cat, but the cigarettes and the life she’d lived had aged her so that most people would guess she was older. _She really is pretty,_ Jon thought. _I wish she would laugh like that more often._

“You boys were brilliant,” she said, still smiling widely. “I honestly never dreamed Eddard and Catelyn would allow six dogs to remain in the house with so little protest.”

The mocking tone had returned to her voice as she said his uncle’s and aunt’s names, and it soured the moment just a bit for him. “Why do you always do that?” he asked her. “They never make fun of you, you know.”

The last of the smile left her face. “Of course they don’t. They’re perfect.” She finished the beer and grabbed another one off the bar. “I’m going outside. I need a cigarette.”

He watched her walk outside and then turned to flip through the sketchbook again. He saw himself at around age five dragging that ratty old bear he used to take everywhere across the floor of one of their old apartments, at seven or eight throwing nuts at squirrels in the park they’d lived by then, at ten holding his mother’s guitar with his tongue actually stuck out as he tried to concentrate on getting the chords right. Finally, he saw a picture of himself from his and Robb’s high school graduation, only Robb wasn’t in it. He had just tossed his hat in the air, and looking at him from a small distance away were Uncle Ned and Aunt Cat. They were holding hands, of course, and both of them looked at him with such incredible love and pride that he almost wanted to cry. He remembered that moment very well. Then he looked again at his own face in the picture. His mother had captured him just as he had seen them looking at him, and the expression on his own face showed everything he’d felt in that moment for the wonderful people who’d raised him. 

He stared at that picture as he finished his beer and wondered what she’d felt then. He honestly didn’t remember her being there in that moment at all. Obviously, she’d not been standing with Uncle Ned and Aunt Cat, but he couldn’t remember why. He remembered her hugging him when he and Robb had finally made their way through all their friends to find the family just outside the gym. She’d been standing with everyone else then. Had she even sat with the family during the ceremony? It had only been a little over a year ago, and he felt bad that he couldn’t remember her part in it any better.

He closed the sketchbook, grabbed the three beers off the bar and walked outside. His mother was sitting in the same place she’d been before, sucking on her cigarette and drinking her beer. 

“Here,” he said, sitting down and putting the beers down on the table in front of her. “I thought I’d save us a trip back in.” 

“You’re a good man, Jon.”

“You’re a hell of an artist, Mom.”

“Why, thank you,” she said with a flourish.

“No,” he said. “I’m serious. I mean those pictures . . .they . . .” He shook his head. “You really are a great singer, I know, but . . .I think you missed your calling.”

She laughed.

“No,” he said. “Really.” He sounded stupid. Maybe it was the beer talking, but he had to make her understand. “They’re not just pictures. It’s like . . .they’re alive. You could really make something great.”

She sat her beer down on the table in front of her and looked at him for a long time. _I have her eyes,_ Jon thought. _I may look like Uncle Ned, but my eyes are exactly the same as Mom’s._

“I already made something great, Jon,” she said softly. “And I gave it away.”

She turned away from him then and took another drag on her cigarette, and it occurred to Jon suddenly that she was talking about him. He thought of that picture from his graduation, and he recalled her words. _It’s just something I started doing about a year back._ She’d started drawing her memories after his graduation.

“No you didn’t,” he said.

She turned around to look at him, and he saw tears in her eyes. “You never gave me away, Mom.”

“What do you call it then?” she asked him, almost in a whisper. “You belong to Ned and Cat more than to me.”

_Ned and Cat. No Eddard and Catelyn._ She made fun of them because she envied them. She was grateful to them but she resented them. Jon understood it so much more now.

“No. I don’t. I belong to myself. You taught me that.”

She looked at him without speaking, looking as if she might cry.

And you didn’t give me away.” He smiled at her. “You shared me. It’s what you do. You’ve always shared what you love best, you know. Your singing. Your opinions. Your bad jokes.”

She was laughing now even as the tears still filled her eyes. “My jokes are excellent.”

“No, they aren’t,” he said firmly. “But you are.” He lifted his beer bottle. “To my mother, the one and only Lyanna Stark--soon to be featured in art galleries worldwide!”

She laughed harder. “I never meant to show those to anyone, you know.”

“Too late. We’re showing them to everyone in the family tomorrow. Well, except Robb. He doesn’t get home until Saturday. So you have to stay at least until then because his girlfriend’s an art major and she’s interning at a gallery in town this summer, and he’ll show your stuff to her, and . . .”

“Jon! Stop it!” She was shaking her head and still laughing, and he realized she was drunk. While he suspected his mother had drunk more than her fair share of alcohol over the years, she wasn’t exactly a large person, and she’d had a couple drinks earlier with Uncle Ned and Aunt Cat even before the five beers she’d now drunk with him.

“Okay, Mom. We’ll plan your next career later,” he laughed. _Hell, I’m drunk, too,_ he realized as he opened his sixth beer. “But at least promise me you’ll stay until Saturday. I want you to.”

She stopped laughing then. “I’ll stay,” she said softly. “Because you want me to.”

She dropped her cigarette into her now empty bottle and opened her sixth beer. “Cheers, son!” she said, and they clinked their bottles together before settling back in their seats to finish these last beers in the most comfortable silence Jon could ever remember sharing with his mother.


	38. Final Interview

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the tumblr prompt: Ned x Cat: "Everything's going to be fine."
> 
> Modern AU in which Catelyn feels nervous and conflicted about possibly going back to work for the first time since Robb was a baby.

Catelyn Stark looked in the mirror and frowned. The new suit was lovely—professional, but flattering, and it fit her well. She’d pulled her hair back away from her face and twisted it up at the nape of her neck. She thought it looked okay. Lysa had suggested she cut it short if she wanted to look really professional. _“Besides, Cat, you’re past forty. You’re getting a little old for long hair, you know.”_

Catelyn’s frown deepened as she recalled that conversation, and she wondered if her sister was right about that. She couldn’t cut her hair, though. Ned would hate it. She honestly didn’t think she’d like it either. _If they don’t want me because of my hair, I want no part of them,_ she thought, biting her lip and still wondering if she should have cut it at least a bit shorter.

“Wow! The next Assistant Director of Personnel Services for Northern TeleCommunications is a knockout! Think there’s any chance she’d go out with a guy who works at a stodgy old financial corporation?”

Catelyn turned around to see her husband smiling at her from the doorway, and she tried to smile back. “Thank you, my love, but I don’t have the job yet.”

“I am quite confident that you do, Cat,” Ned said, coming to over to kiss her lightly on the cheek. Long years of marriage had taught him that he had to be careful of makeup and hair if she was ready to leave the house for something important. “You have the degree they want from a prestigious school where you earned top marks. You have all the experience they’ve asked for. Your references are glowing. What else could they ask for?”

“Someone whose experience isn’t over fifteen years old,” she muttered, turning back to the mirror to frown at her reflection once more.

“Stop frowning at my beautiful wife,” he said, coming to stand behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. Looking at her in the mirror, he said, “Look at yourself, Cat. You are amazing. And I’m not just talking about how gorgeous you are. You got offered a high level job at a Fortune 500 company right out of college, remember? And by twenty-five you were practically running their Human Resources department.”

She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Not quite. I was in charge of the satellite offices only.”

“And how many people did that include?”

She sighed. “About two thousand.”

“And how many employees does Northern have?”

“Eleven hundred.”

He smiled. “See? You’ve done this job before, Cat. You’ve done a bigger job before.” He put his face beside hers so that she was looking at both their reflections. “I look in that mirror, and I see a woman capable of doing anything she sets her mind to. And that’s what they’ll see in this interview.”

“I see a forty-two year old woman who hasn’t had a job in seventeen years,” she said darkly.

“Hasn’t had a job? So our children have been raising themselves, have they?” He shook his head. “You haven’t had a paycheck, my love, but don’t you ever say you haven’t had a job.”

She turned around to look him in the face. “I’m scared, Ned,” she admitted. “What if I can’t do this?”

“You can do this, Cat. Think of all the people who applied for this job, and the interviews you’ve gone through already! It’s down to five candidates now. All you have to do is be yourself. It’s a job dealing with people, for God’s sake. If anyone can talk to you for five minutes without realizing no one manages people better than you do, then that someone is an idiot.”

She had to smile at him in spite of her lingering doubts. “I love you, you know. But you do realize all of those other candidates are younger than I am. And all currently employed.”

“So what?”

She laughed out loud then before turning back to the mirror with a sigh. She stood there regarding her reflection for a long time before he spoke again.

“What is it, Cat? Something more is bothering you. I can tell.”

She closed her eyes and sighed again, thinking, _God, he knows me so well._ Slowly, she turned to face her husband once more. “Am I doing the right thing, Ned?”

“By ignoring Lysa’s advice on your hair? Yes. Absolutely. No offense, but your sister is an idiot.”

She looked at him, wide-eyed with shock. “How do you know about that?”

He smiled. “Sansa heard the two of you talking.”

“And she told you?”

“No. She told Robb. Robb told me.”

Catelyn shook her head. “There are no secrets in this house.”

“None,” he agreed, cheerfully. “You never actually considered cutting it short, did you?”

“No,” she said. “Not seriously.” She chewed on her lip. “But I am being serious now, Ned. What if I do get this job? It’s full time, and Rickon is only six. Am I being selfish to do this?”

“Rickon starts school full time in a month, Cat. You always planned to go back to work once all the kids were in school.” He smiled at her. “Of course, we didn’t plan to have quite so many kids. If only they weren’t so fun to make …”

“Stop it, Ned,” she said, smacking his hand as he reached around to grab at her behind. “I know he’ll be in school, but I was always here for the others when they were this small. What if he gets sick? Or he wants me to chaperone a field trip? And even the other kids will have a hard time getting used to my not always being here. Arya’s just turned twelve. That’s a hard age for a girl, Ned. And Sansa is just starting high …”

Her words were cut off as her husband grabbed her tightly and put his mouth on hers, kissing her quite soundly. She started to protest, but the tension and fears that had built up inside her instead drove her to throw her arms around his neck and kiss him back with equal intensity. When they finally broke apart, both of them breathing a bit faster than normally, he looked at her very directly with those grey eyes she loved so much.

“Everything’s going to be fine.”

“What?” she said, her mind still spinning from his kiss.

“Everything’s going to be fine, Cat,” he repeated. “You are the finest mother any child ever had, and I know you miss working. You loved your job before Robb was born, and you’ll love it again.” He touched a hand to her lips before she could protest. “Of course, you love the children more. So do I, my love, and yet I’ve never stopped working. They will be fine, Cat. They will adjust. They will likely whine and complain because that’s what children do, but then they will be more than fine. Because whether you are here all day or making certain everyone knows what’s what at Northern TeleCommunications, you remain the finest mother any child ever had. They’ll only be even more proud of you than they already are.”

“And if I don’t get the job?”

“Then the people at Northern are unbelievably stupid, and I wouldn’t want you working for such fools, anyway.”

She laughed again and actually felt more at ease than she had since she’d gotten out of bed that morning.

“I love you,” she told him again.

“And I love you,” he said very firmly. “And I truly believe with all my heart that you will come home with that job today. You deserve it, and you’ll be damn good at it. But one way or the other, Cat, I promise you that everything’s going to be fine.”

She smiled up at him, and he kissed her again, this time putting a hand to the back of her neck just where she’d twisted up her hair. Not even caring that she’d likely now have to repair her hair as well as her lipstick, she returned his kiss.

“Everything’s going to be fine,” he whispered against her lips, and as she drew confidence from the strength in his arms and the warmth of his breath, she believed him.


	39. The Fiercest Pup of All

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the tumblr prompt: "Stop trying to cheer me up!" for Rickon and his sisters
> 
> Rickon was a little frightened of the direwolf pups at first, but his sisters figured out how to help him get over that.
> 
> a canon compliant Starkling drabble of the day the direwolf pups came to Winterfell

“I am not a baby!” Rickon shouted.

“Of course you aren’t, Rickon,” Sansa said. “No one said you are.”

“Theon said I was afraid of my wolf. I am not afraid of my wolf!”

As if agitated by the little boy’s shouting, the black wolf pup snarled and snapped in the direction of Theon Greyjoy who jumped involuntarily.

Robb and Jon both cackled.

“Looks like you’re the one frightened of Rickon’s pup, Greyjoy,” Robb teased, as he stood there holding the pup he had named Grey Wind in his arms.

“I’m not afraid of anything I can send flying with well aimed boot,” Theon replied nastily.

“Don’t you kick Shaggydog!” Rickon snarled, looking and sounding remarkably like a fierce little pup himself.

Arya started to comment on that when Theon’s laughter rang out loudly. “Shaggydog? You’re calling it Shaggydog? That’s the stupidest name yet.”

Rickon’s face fell, and his lip started to quiver just a little. Before he could actually be accused of crying, he turned and fled from the kitchen, and the black wolf pup started to run after him. Bran grabbed it, though, struggling to hold onto it with one arm as his other arm was already wrapped around his own pup.

“He’s just a little boy, Theon. What pleasure do you get from making fun of him?”

Arya looked up from watching Bran struggle with two wolf pups at the sound of her bastard brother’s voice. Jon and Robb were both glaring at Theon, and she joined them in doing so.

“He’s just mad because he doesn’t have a direwolf,” she said smugly.

“I wouldn’t want one of those mangy things. They aren’t likely to live anyway,” Theon said nastily. “Especially that one.” He pointed to Jon’s Ghost. “It’s obviously a freak.” He smiled then. “Maybe it’s a bastard.”

“Enough, Theon.”

Arya was glad to hear Robb speak up. He was the most likely of all her siblings to actually side with Theon in things, but even he wouldn’t put up with Theon being so terribly mean to Rickon and Jon. And he’s the only one of them Theon would ever actually listen to.

“Fine. You children play with your dogs. I have better things to do.” Theon then turned on his heel and left the kitchen at a much slower pace than Rickon had.

“Good riddance,” Arya muttered, and Jon laughed.

“I think you’re right, little sister. He’s miffed that he didn’t get a direwolf pup, too.”

“Why don’t you just let Shaggydog go?” Arya asked Bran who was still struggling to restrain the pup. He’d let go of his own wolf now, and it simply sat calmly beside him.

“Are we really going to let Rickon name him that?” Robb asked, rolling his eyes.

Arya glared at him.

“What? I didn’t say it in front of Rickon,” Robb said. “And Bran, what are you trying to do to that pup?”

“Keep it here,” Bran grunted. “Rickon was a little scared of it, even if he won’t admit it. If it tears off after him, he’s likely to run and then it’ll chase him which will make him even more scared.”

“Give it here,” Sansa sighed, tearing herself away from petting the pup she had named Lady to reach for the wiggling black pup. Her pup, like Bran’s, at perfectly still at her side.

“What are you going to do with him, Sansa?” Arya asked, giggling as Nymeria jumped up on her lap nearly knocking her off balance.

“Take him to Rickon, of course,” Sansa said in her ‘grown-up-sound-like-Mother’ voice that Arya hated. “We can’t just leave him out there to cry. And I think if he can spend some time with just his pup and not so many wolves jumping around, he’ll learn to be less afraid.”

Arya hated to admit it, but Sansa made sense. “I’ll come with you,” she said. “But what do we do with Nymeria and Lady?”

“Nymeria?” Sansa asked.

“Yes. I’ve decided. My wolf is a warrior queen.”

“I like it,” Jon said loyally. “How about yours, Bran? I think all the wolves are named now except yours.”

“I’m still thinking,” Bran said. Turning to Arya, he said, “You can leave your wolves here. I’ll watch them.”

“It’s time to get all those pups out of the kitchen if you expect the cooks to prepare you anything to eat.” The steward, Vayon Poole, was coming toward them, and he looked less than happy about the six wolf pups in the kitchen.

“Our lady mother let us bring them in here,” Sansa said sweetly, and Arya wondered if she practiced talking to grown-ups like that or if it just came naturally to her.

“Yes, she did, Lady Sansa,” Vayon answered. “But Lady Stark is not here any longer. She has gone to speak with your lord father about something, and I doubt she intended that you make the kitchen the wolves’ new home.”

“No,” Robb said. “She only wanted a warm place for Rickon and the girls to meet the wolves that was sort of out of the way.”

“I understand, Lord Robb, but as I said, if you would like to eat again some time today, I fear your wolf pups must relinquish the kitchen to the cooks.”

Robb laughed. “Well I definitely want to eat. How about you, Snow?”

Jon grinned. “I’m as hungry as you are, Stark.” He looked at Bran. “Why don’t we take all our pups out and find them a place to stay. We can take the girls’ pups with us easily enough. Robb and I will each carry two.”

“And we’ll take the black one …” Sansa started.

“Shaggydog,” Arya interrupted.

Sansa rolled her eyes just as Robb had. “Shaggydog,” she said, “to Rickon.” Turning to her sister, she said, “Come along, Arya,” in the ‘trying-to-be-Mother’ voice again, and Arya looked at Jon and rolled her own eyes as she followed her out.

Jon’s laughter made Arya grin as she and Sansa stepped out into the courtyard.

“Where do you suppose he went?” Sansa asked.

“Godswood,” Arya said. “That’s where he always goes.”

“How do you know?” Sansa asked.

Arya sighed. “Because it’s usually me or Bran he’s running away from. Rickon gets angry easily. He thinks he’s big enough to do whatever anybody else does even though he isn’t. And it makes him mad.”

“All right,” Sansa said.

“Look at that!” Arya said, pointing to the wolf pup in Sansa’s arms.

“What?” her sister asked her.

“He stopped struggling as soon as you started walking toward the godswood.” She grinned. “Even Rickon’s wolf knows where he is.”

“That’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard, Arya.”

But it was true. The wolf pup hadn’t stopped wriggling around the entire time Sansa held it until they started toward the godswood. “I think direwolves are smart,” she told her sister. “A lot smarter than dogs.”

Sansa did smile at that. “I think so, too,” she said.

Rickon was indeed in the godswood. He sat on a flat rock with his arms wrapped around the knees he had pulled up to his chest, and he faced away from them.

“Go away!” he said with a pout in his voice when he heard them approach him.

“Rickon, you know you’re not allowed to run off into the godswood alone,” Sansa said in her annoyingly reasonable voice.

“Stop making fun of me!” Rickon demanded, and Arya nearly laughed at the look on Sansa’s face. Her impersonation of Mother didn’t work as well on Rickon as it did on everyone else.

“I’m not making fun of you, Rickon. I only told you the truth. Turn around and look here. We’ve brought you Shaggydog.”

“Shaggydog?” Rickon said with more interest, turning slowly around, and Arya was pleased Sansa had used the pup’s name.

“Here he is!” Sansa said with a smile, holding him up.

The pup gave a yelp and tried to jump out of her arms to get to Rickon, who startled and tumbled off his rock.

Rickon jumped up to his feet and glared at them as if daring them to laugh. Neither girl so much as smiled.

“Look, Rickon,” Sansa said gently, running a hand through the squirming pup’s black fur as she held him tightly. “He’s a sweet little baby. He wouldn’t hurt anybody.”

“Yes, he would,” Rickon insisted. “He’s not a baby.”

“Of course, he is. He’s only a pup,” Sansa insisted. “Come pet him.”

“Stop making fun of me!”

Sansa sighed in exasperation. “I’m not making fun of you, Rickon. I’m trying to cheer you up.”

“Stop trying to cheer me up!”

At that, Arya couldn’t keep herself from laughing. The look on Sansa’s face was too good, and Rickon glaring at her just made her laugh harder. Finally, she calmed down enough to say, “Let go of Shaggydog, Sansa.”

“I don’t want him to run off,” Sansa said.

“He won’t. Put him down.”

Sansa frowned, just like Mother did when she was about to explain why what you wanted to do was not appropriate. Before Sansa could start talking, Arya walked up to her and grabbed Shaggydog out of her arms before she could protest.

“Arya!” she snapped angrily.

Shaggydog wiggled furiously, trying to escape her grip, and Arya had to give Sansa credit for having held on to him so long.

“Look at him, Rickon!” she said to her little brother. “He’s desperate to get away from me. He doesn’t like being held like a baby.”

That got her brother’s attention.

“I think he’s probably the fiercest one of the bunch,” she continued.

“He is!” Rickon agreed immediately.

“Arya …” Sansa started to say.

“That’s why he’s yours, I think,” Arya went on as if Sansa hadn’t spoken. “Because you’re too fierce to be a baby, too.”

Rickon grinned at her. Then he took a tentative step toward her with his hand extended toward the direwolf pup. “I’m not afraid of him,” he said, sounding rather apprehensive.

“Of course, you aren’t,” she said. “I am, just a little. Because he’s so fierce. And Theon should be very afraid of him.”

That made Rickon grin again.

“But you don’t have to be afraid of him because he’s yours,” Arya said with confidence. “So he’ll never bite you except play bites.”

“Play bites,” Rickon repeated carefully, moving even closer to Arya and the wolf. “Those don’t hurt, right?”

“Nah. He’s got sharp little teeth so it might scratch a bit. A baby might cry about it, but not a brave boy like you.”

“And he’ll lick you,” Sansa added, finally seeming to understand how this worked. “His tongue is a little bit rough, but it tickles more than hurts, and you’re way too big to bothered by tickling.”

Rickon’s hand reached the direwolf pup then, and he only jerked it back slightly when the pup immediately put his snout toward it. Then he eased it forward again and allowed the pup to lick his fingers. He giggled. “It does tickle,” he said. “Just like the puppies from the kennels.”

“He’s a lot like the puppies in the kennels, Rickon,” Sansa assured him. “Only bigger.”

“And much more dangerous,” Arya added cheerfully. “To everyone who isn’t you, of course.”

“He’s fierce,” Rickon said, now with both hands on the wolf pup’s head. “But he’s mine.”

“He’s all yours,” Arya agreed.

Rickon smiled and stuck his face right down into the pup’s and then laughed loudly as the animal proceeded to lick his face all over.

Arya looked at her sister over Rickon’s head and grinned.

Sansa smiled back and mouthed at her, “Well done.”

Arya rolled her eyes at her older sister, but actually she was pleased that Sansa had recognized that she had known how to cheer Rickon up and get him over his fear of the wolf pup. When Rickon demanded to hold Shaggydog, she knew she’d been completely successful.

Her littlest brother’s arms weren’t quite big enough to handle the squirming wolf, though, and this time Sansa came up with the solution.

“Can I hold him with you, Rickon?” she asked. “I confess I was a little afraid of him when I carried him here, but if you’re holding him, I know he’ll be good, and I would like to learn to be less afraid of him.”

Rickon nodded thoughtfully. “Do you want me to help you hold him, too, Arya?” he asked seriously, and Arya bit her lip hard and tried to keep her face grave as she nodded back to him.

When they finally emerged from the godswood, they were walking very slowly all bunched together with Rickon in the center. His little arms were wrapped around his pup as well as he could manage while Sansa and Arya supported the animal from either side. As anxious as she was to find the boys and have her own wolf pup with her again, Arya found that she rather liked walking with her brother and sister like this. Rickon was pretty fierce for someone who was still pretty much a baby whatever he had to say about it, and she had to admit that even Sansa wasn’t horrible all the time.


	40. Stranded Here With You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for this tumblr prompt: "Are you fucking kidding me?" ned x cat please :D
> 
> A modern AU in which Ned Stark ends up on a flight with his dead brother's fiancee, and then an enormous winter storm grounds all air traffic.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“I’m sorry, Mr. . . .” The hotel clerk looked down at the paper again. “Stark. There are simply no other rooms. In fact, you’re lucky we have even the one. This blizzard was a bit of surprise, and there are more stranded travelers here than people who actually live in Moat Cailin, I think.”

“But we could be stranded here for days! And we’re . . .we’re not . . .” He motioned helplessly with his arm back and forth between Catelyn Tully and himself.

“It’s all right, Ned,” he heard her say quietly. 

“But, Cat . . .”

“What else are we going to do? Look out a window, Ned. We’re liable to be stuck here for days, and I’m not spending them sleeping on the floor in an airport terminal.” She actually managed to laugh then. “Not that I think we could even get back to the airport. That cab barely got us here in the first place. I thought we were about to die more than once.”

He smiled at her then, in spite of the situation. Catelyn Tully was easy to smile at. “It’s only snow,” he teased. “I always forget you’re a southern girl who’s frightened by flurries.”

“Hey!” She whacked his arm with her purse. “These are NOT flurries, and you know it, Ned! If the airport in _Winterfell,_ of all places, actually closed down causing us to divert here, it’s more like a snowpocalypse!”

“Point taken,” he sighed.

“So, do you want the room or not?” the tired hotel clerk interjected. The hotel lobby was full of people still, and no doubt the poor girl just wanted to either get them checked in or give the room to the next people in line to simply be done with the whole business.

Ned looked at Cat, and she nodded. “We’ll take it,” he said.

Moat Cailin was a basically a map dot, and the little town only had an airport and a few hotels because of the old fortress. The ruins of the enormous ancient towers which were visible from everywhere in town (except during blizzard conditions) were a bit of a tourist attraction. Still, there were no large chain hotels, nothing modern about the town at all. Being in Moat Cailin was a bit like being at least twenty years in the past, and Ned simply shook his head as the clerk handed him an actual room key instead of an electronic access card. When they got to the door of the room, Ned held it up and laughed. “Hopefully, I still remember how to use one of these.”

“Surely, you at least have a real key for your house,” she teased.

“Somewhere,” he said, as he more or less forced the rather ill-fitting key into the lock and began wiggling it. “I always come in through the electric garage door, though.”

She laughed. “Pretend it’s your car.”

He felt the tumblers give way finally, and as the key turned, he opened the door. “Success!” he cried gleefully.

“Oh, my,” he said when he surveyed the room, rather dismayed at the size of it. The one bed was a decent size, but it took up nearly all the available floor space. There was scarcely room to walk between it and the antique looking dresser, and the only other piece of furniture in the room was an old fashioned little table with a single wooden straightbacked chair that sure as hell couldn’t be slept on.

“What a charming little room!” Catelyn exclaimed at the same time, and he turned to look at her. A genuine smile lit up her face. “It’s like something out of a dollhouse,” she said to him. “I’d forgotten places like this actually existed.”

“Well, it’s about the size of a dollhouse,” he said wryly. He had both of their bags, and he hoisted Catelyn’s onto the dresser and then gingerly placed his own slightly smaller bag on the little table which thankfully did not break under the weight. “Do you want me to see if I can find us something to eat?”

She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

He wasn’t either. They’d been at the Moat Cailin Airport for hours just trying to figure out what could be done and then waiting for a cab into town, and they’d eaten sandwiches at the one little eatery there. “Me neither,” he agreed.

“I’m, um, going to change out of these clothes,” Catelyn said, and he wished the sudden flash of pink on her cheeks didn’t affect him the way that it did. “It’s awfully late, and I’m exhausted.”

She’d been a hell of trooper through today’s long travel ordeal, and her attitude had been more positive than his own pretty much all day, but he could hear the weariness in her voice now. And the sadness. Almost unconsciously, he reached out to take her hand.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t get there, Cat,” he said softly.

“I am, too,” she said, and he saw her bite her lip as the tears came to her eyes. It was odd how achingly familiar all her expressions and gestures were after not having seen her for over a year. “Do you think they’ll still go ahead with the service? Even with the blizzard?”

It was the first time she’d asked that question, and the tiny bit of hope he heard in her voice broke his heart. “Yeah,” he said softly. “It’s Winterfell, Cat. They had to close the airport because there are federal safety regulations, you know. But they’re undoubtedly already plowing roads and putting chains on cars and making fun of every location to the south that’s paralyzed by a little snowfall. They’ll refuse to cancel out of sheer northern stubborness.”

She frowned. “You’d think they might consider canceling simply because you can’t make it there.”

He shrugged his shoulders a little. “Ben and Lya might want to do that. But it’s about more than just Brandon, and . . .” He shrugged again.

“It doesn’t seem fair,” she said then. “You’re his brother.”

 _And you should have been his wife._ “Life’s not fair,” he said simply. “Go on and get yourself ready to sleep, Cat. You at least deserve a decent night’s rest after this day.”

He watched her rummage around in her bag for a few moments and retrieve several things before disappearing into the tiny bathroom. No tub, he noted. Just a shower. One more sleeping option erased. He sat down on the abysmally uncomfortable single chair and surveyed the floor space critically once more, trying to figure out which span of it would come the closest to accommodating him in a supine position.

His thoughts kept going to Catelyn, though. He heard the shower running and hated himself for immediately thinking of her being naked just behind that door. _You are an asshole, Ned Stark,_ he told himself. _It isn’t enough that you fell so hard for your brother’s girl that you more or less couldn’t stand to be around him the last year of his life, but now instead of being upset about missing an event in honor of his bravery, you’re just trying to fight off the boner you’re getting thinking about water running over her breasts and down her . . . Fuck!_

He stood up abruptly and cursed the room for being too small to even pace in effectively. He’d nearly died when she’d come running up to him in the terminal in King’s Landing early this morning, a wide smile on her beautiful face. “Ned!” she’d cried out excitedly. “Don’t tell me you’re on this flight, too!”

He’d known she would come, of course. She and Lyanna still kept in touch a bit, although Lyanna rarely spoke about Cat to him. His little sister was more observant than most people, and Ned had long feared she suspected more than he’d like about his feelings toward Catelyn Tully. But he’d had no idea Cat had been living in King’s Landing for the past six months (“I felt I needed something new, you know? And Lysa and Jon wanted me to come . . .and teaching pays better here, so . . .”). He’d certainly not been prepared for her to throw her arms around him in the airport making his head spin and his heart race before she dragged him to the ticket counter to have their seats put together.

The first part of the flight from King’s Landing had been pleasant enough. She’d told him a bit of her life in King’s Landing, and all about how much she loved the children in the school where she worked. Her face lit up as she spoke about ‘her kids’ as she called them, and Ned had found himself entranced by her voice, her expressions, her very presence.

She’d asked all about what he’d been doing, of course, and laughed about his brief responses, telling him that he hadn’t changed a bit, and that it was a shame that so few people would ever get to know how truly fascinating he was.

“I’m hardly fascinating,” he’d protested.

“Oh, but you are!” she’d insisted. “Ned, you are one of the most intelligent, thoughtful, and really caring people I know. You always have been.” She’d grinned at him. “And I remember you could be quite funny when you really wanted to be.”

He’d made a face at her then that made her laugh and shake her head. “But getting you to talk is like pulling teeth, and I’m afraid most people are simply too lazy to make the effort! Their loss!” she’d said emphatically.

He’d forced himself to breathe easily and not think of all the things he’d always wanted to say to her. Things he would never be able to say to her. 

Then the weather had turned foul. The plane had taken any number of sudden lurches and she’d gripped his hand tightly and her face had gone quite pale. Truthfully, it was the roughest flight he’d ever been on as well, but he hadn’t told her that. Whatever anxiety he’d felt, he’d squashed down in an attempt to keep her from being too frightened. They’d flown longer than their originally scheduled flight time into a vicious headwind only to learn that they were still well south of Winterfell and that a freak storm had actually closed the airport there. They didn’t have enough fuel to go back to KL, and so they were being diverted to Moat Cailin where the weather was bad and getting worse, but not quite as terrible as it was in Winterfell yet.

And now he was sharing a hotel room with his dead brother’s girl. The woman who should have been Brandon’s wife and the mother of his children rather than the tragic, griefstricken fiancee of a dead hero. The woman to whom Ned had compared every woman he dated or even met for so long now, it had become impossible for him not to do it. _The woman I love. The woman I can never have._

He attempted to lie down on the floor between the bed and the wall which separated the little bedroom from the microscopic bathroom. The space was only about two feet wide, but it was at least long enough, and he thought that maybe . . .

“What on earth are you doing?”

He looked up to see Cat standing there in a loose t-shirt and baggy sweat pants with a towel wrapped around her head. She looked down at him with an amused expression.

“Trying to figure out where I’m sleeping.”

She shook her head. “I believe that’s what the bed is for, Ned.”

“You get the bed, Cat. No arguments.”

“It’s a double bed, silly.” 

Whatever shocked expression came to his face, it must have been hilarious because she doubled over with laughter. When she finally stopped laughing, she apologized. “I’m sorry, Ned. You just looked so . . .” She shook her head and stuck out her hand to him. “Get up off the floor, silly man. We are both grown-ups. We have known each other for years. You said yourself we will be here more than one night. Maybe close to a week! You cannot sleep on that miserable floor.” 

He took her hand and stood up. “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable, Cat. I mean . . .”

She sighed. “I know,” she said. “And, yes, it will be a little weird. But it’s a place to sleep, Ned. And God knows if there’s anyone I trust enough to actually sleep beside, it’s you.” 

He wasn’t certain she would feel that way if she knew what the mere thought of sharing a bed with her was doing to him.

“I’ll . . .get changed,” he said, needing to not be in the same room with her in order to get his thoughts into some kind of order.

When he emerged from the bathroom after his own shower (which had been difficult to get through as touching his own naked body for no purpose other than washing while thinking of her lying in bed was NOT an easy proposition, and he’d refused to consider doing otherwise), he found her propped up on a pillow, her still damp auburn hair spread out behind her. For all her bravado, he couldn’t help noting the covers were pulled up as far as she could get them and that she was positioned on the extreme far edge of the bed.

“I’ll get the light,” he said, and when he slipped into the bed, he stayed as far to his side as she was on hers. He normally slept in nothing but boxers and it felt odd to be wearing clothes in bed, but it would have felt far more uncomfortable without his t-shirt and shorts. He wished he had brought some long pants other than jeans and suit pants, but was at least thankful he’d thrown in the gym shorts. He’d figured this trip would be stressful and that he’d need to work out to help deal with family and memories. He’d had no idea just how stressful it was going to get!

“Ned?” Her voice came to him quietly from the dark.

“Yeah?”

“I knew you were in King’s Landing. Lya told me you’d gone to work on Robert’s staff when he got elected to the legislature.”

He swallowed. Of course, he’d realized she’d had to know. But she hadn’t had any reason to contact him. He knew that. “Yeah. Who’d ever have pegged Robert as a politician, huh? But there are some who honestly think he’s got a shot at a run for the presidency once he’s old enough. A lot of people are very unhappy with the status quo.”

She snorted. “Well, I might vote for him if you promise he’ll run everything he does by you first. You’d make a much better president.”

“I don’t want to be president.”

“Of course, you don’t.” He could hear the smile. “But, Ned . . .” her voice was serious once more. “I thought about calling you. When I moved to King’s Landing. I even looked up your number.”

That surprised him. He didn’t know what she expected him to say so he simply said nothing.

“I didn’t figure you’d want to hear from me,” she said then.

“I’ll always want to hear from you, Cat.” It was true. Seeing her again was painful. Lying beside her here was excruciating. But he’d still want to hear from her, if she truly wanted to see him.

“Really? You weren’t around much those last few months before . . .when we were planning the wedding, I mean. And after Brandon’s funeral, I only saw you a few times.”

“I’m sorry, Cat. After Brandon died, I didn’t think you’d want me around. That I’d just be a . . .reminder of him or whatever.” That part was true enough, but he had to steel himself to say the next part, because lying didn’t come easily to him. “As for before that . . .well, I was just busy, I guess. You know.” 

“Oh. I thought maybe I’d done something to upset you.” She paused. “I missed you, Ned. I thought we were friends.”

It had gotten very difficult to breathe, and he wondered if the air on her side of the bed was as thick and heavy as on his. “We were. We are, I mean. I’ll always be here for you, Catelyn.”

He heard a slight rustling sound beside him and suddenly he felt her hand against his. Her fingers closed around his and she squeezed.

“Sometimes, I’m still angry at him,” she said after a moment. “And I feel a bit of a hypocrite even coming for the dedication of this monument because . . .Ned, he never should have done what he did. It was more stupid than brave.”

He wondered if she’d made this admission to anyone else, but he doubted it. Because he felt the same way, and had never admitted it to anyone. “Brandon never thought before he did anything. But he was brave.”

“He never considered consequences. And I always do. Too much. Sometimes I wonder if we even . . .”

She didn’t finish the sentence, and he found himself wondering what she’d been about to say. He wouldn’t ask her though.

“I bet Barbrey will be there,” she said after a moment, and that startled Ned.

“Probably. She lost family members that day, too.”

Catelyn actually laughed. “I know she loved him, Ned. It isn’t her fault that he chose me. And he is dead after all. I have no reason to be jealous anymore, and I’m not. But sometimes I am still angry at him--over killing himself, not over Barbrey.”

“He didn’t mean to kill himself.”

“No. But he was as careless of his life as he was of other people’s feelings. And that still makes me angry.”

He’d never heard her speak of Brandon that way. His brother had been a good, brave man, but he definitely had a selfish streak and an inflated confidence in his own importance that likely made it possible for him to believe he could honestly succeed in getting people out of that fire two years ago when the fire department had declared it a lost cause and pulled their men out. 

“I’m not leaving my father in there to die!” Brandon had been heard to scream at his commander, and he’d disobeyed the direct order, broken free of the men trying to hold him back and charged back into the burning nightclub where over a hundred patrons, including Rickard Stark were likely already dead from smoke inhalation. The roof had collapsed just after that, and Brandon had been buried in the burning rubble.

Seven firefighters in total had lost their lives that night, and while a memorial to all the victims of that terrible fire had been erected at the sight of the nightclub on the first anniversary of the tragedy, a new monument specifically dedicated to the firefighters who’d sacrificed themselves in the name of others was being dedicated on the second anniversary. Seven names were inscribed on it. Six men who’d died doing their jobs, and one man who’d died doing exactly what he damn well chose to do.

“I’m angry at him, too,” he admitted after a moment, for the first time ever, and he felt her squeeze his hand again. “But . . .it’s who he was, Cat. We can’t spend the rest of our lives being mad at him for just being Brandon.”

She sighed. “I know. I want to let him go, Ned. Whether that’s right or wrong, I don’t know. But I do know I have to stop being angry in order to do that.”

They’d both been lying on their backs, their clasped hands between them, but he felt her turn to face him and he turned his head to look at her. His eyes had adjusted to the dark enough to make out her face. “I’m glad you’re here, Ned,” she told him. “It’s funny, because I haven’t spoken to you in I don’t know how long, and yet I can tell you things that I tell no one else, and know you’ll understand me.”

He didn’t know how to answer that so he followed her lead and simply squeezed her hand.

“Don’t disappear again, Ned. Please.” She looked lovely and yet frightened and vulnerable lying there in the dark, blue eyes luminescent in her pale face surrounded by the cloud of her hair.

Lying still rather than pulling her into his arms then was the hardest thing Ned Stark had ever done in his life.

“I’m right here, Cat. And I’m not going anywhere. I promise.” He meant it, too. If she needed him, he would be here, in whatever capacity she needed him to be. At whatever the cost to him.

She sighed, a soft sound of relief and gratitude and turned away slightly without letting go of his hand. She spoke no more, and soon the regular sound of her breathing told Ned she was asleep.

He lay awake in the dark for a long time, holding Catelyn Tully’s hand and telling himself that it was enough. But a tiny seed of hope had taken root inside him, and as he felt the warmth of those long, slim fingers in his, he knew that something between them had changed, and he prayed for the strength and patience to let it become whatever it was meant to be.


	41. Secrets, Sympathy, and Envy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for this tumblr prompt: "Can I tell you a secret?" Lysa and Catelyn (could be some Ned/Cat thrown in, too :D)
> 
> Pre-canon drabble in which Lysa visits Winterfell, intending to keep her new secret to herself, but she finds it difficult not to speak of her good fortune to the sister she pities (and DEFINITELY doesn't envy.)

Lysa Tully Arryn pulled her cloak more tightly around her as she walked from the Great Keep of Winterfell toward her sister’s little sept. How Catelyn even survived here, she could not imagine. Summer was entering its fourth year now, and yet snow flurries danced around her in the air as a brisk wind caused her to shiver in spite of her thick cloak.

 _Poor Cat,_ she thought. _She always loved the warmth of summer sunshine even more than I did. To know that she must spend all the rest of her days without it . . ._ Lysa tried hard not to dwell on the fact that finding reasons to pity her sister helped dull the almost unbearable envy she felt for Catelyn every time she gazed upon her nieces and nephews. Four of them! Two boys and two girls--all healthy and perfect and living--while all of Lysa’s babes perished in her womb. It wasn’t fair!

Lysa frowned and forced such terrible thoughts away from her. She could not think such unkind things toward her sister. Not now, especially. She would invite no possible censure from the gods now that she was certain her moonblood was late again. Her lord husband had come to her chamber the night before she departed King’s Landing for Winterfell, climbing atop her with his wheezing breath and touching her soft skin with his dry, wrinkled hands. She’d taken him in her own hands and stroked him until he’d become hard, knowing that it would go more quickly that way. When he’d finally been firm enough to push inside her, she’d opened her legs to him willingly enough, praying with each thrust that he’d come quickly and that the seed he spilled there would take root and give her a healthy child--a living child. After he’d finished with a grunt, he’d thanked her courteously and then told her that he was pleased she’d finally agreed to visit her sister in Winterfell. He believed it would lighten her spirits to spend time with family, he’d told her, although he would miss her.

 _I do not miss him,_ she thought. It would seem, however, that his attentions to her that night had accomplished their purpose. She’d suspected it in the third week of her journey to Winterfell. _Gods, why must the North be so vast as well as so cold? I thought we’d never reach this place._ She’d begun to feel rather queasy, especially in the mornings. But it had now been seven weeks since Lord Jon’s visit to her bed, and still she had not bled. Now she was sure. So she braved the terrible, cold air of this place to visit the sept early in the morning for she would pray for this babe daily, hourly if need be, and she wished to be there before Catelyn’s morning devotions because she wasn’t certain she was ready to share this secret with her sister yet. Every babe she had whispered of early to Cat with joy and exhilaration in her heart had perished. She would not curse this one with words spoken too soon.

She reached the little sept _(a tiny thing compared even to the sept at Riverrun, let alone the Great Sept of Baelor, but adequate enough--no doubt Cat’s pagan husband had thought to ameliorate the shame he’d done her with his bastard by building it. Poor Cat.)_ , and was about to open the door when she heard her sister’s voice and realized she had not come early enough.

“Ned! Stop it, my lord!”

_Ned? Lord Stark did not keep the Seven. He prayed to the trees as all the barbaric Northmen did. Why would he be here? And why was her sister laughing even as she admonished the man for something?_

“Honestly, Ned, we are in a sept, of all places!” Cat’s voice sounded exasperated, but Lysa could still hear the laughter in it.

“Aye, my lady, and I would not wish to offend your gods.” Lord Stark’s deep voice sounded serious, and yet there was a lightness to it as well--something that Lysa had never heard in it before. “However, as you did not seem to object to my embrace yesterday in the godswood in full view of my own gods, I thought perhaps yours might wish to see how greatly you are valued by your husband as well.”

Catelyn laughed out loud then before replying, “Forgive me, my love. But while you do have a sound point, and I am quite certain the gods would not be shocked by this expression of the love you bear me, I think that Septon Chayle and most certainly Septa Mordane might feel differently if they were to find us here like this.”

_The love you bear me? What the devil is Cat talking about? She has found no more love in her marriage than I! And at least Jon Arryn hasn’t brought me home a bastard! Eddard Stark may not be an old man, but he’s certainly a cold one. Why would Cat speak of love?_

She began to feel rather guilty about listening to them from just outside the door, but she couldn’t bring herself either to enter or walk away. She heard no more talking for a few moments, and then Lord Stark made a rather frustrated groaning sound.

“Gods, Cat!” he said. “I am very pleased that your sister has come to visit. I am. I know it has been far too many years since you have seen her, and it is good for the children to know their aunt as well. But must she sit with you in your chambers so late into the night? And come again to them so early in the mornings? You’ve told me often enough how you shared a room at Riverrun, and I understood her desire to stay in your room with you her first two nights here--just as you had done as girls. Truly, I did. But she still spends more time in your chamber than in her own, and . . .I miss you, Cat.”

Lysa had barely time to absorb these surprising words when her sister’s even more shocking response met her ears.

“I miss you, too, my love. Surely, you must know that.” Cat’s voice was low and rather breathless. 

_My love?_ Lysa thought. _She keeps calling him that! Cat doesn’t love her husband! She resents his shaming of her, but she’s far too dutiful to refuse him. That’s all it is. Perfect, dutiful Cat! And she wants more children. Her Bran is two years old now and fully weaned. She probably thinks she’s entitled to another right away, selfish thing! She doesn’t enjoy lying with that frozen faced man. And now he’s subjecting her to impropriety in a sept! Poor Cat!_

It was silent in the sept for a moment, but then Lysa clearly heard muffled sighs and little moans that came from both of the people within before Lord Stark swore loudly, causing Lysa to jump.

“Gods be good!” He was breathing rather heavily. “I can scarcely tear myself from you, but if I do not, I fear I shall have you on the floor, and we most certainly will shock the good septa!”

“Come to my room tonight, my lord,” Cat said, and Lysa noted her breaths came as raggedly as her husband’s. “I shall tell Lysa I am feeling poorly and must retire early.”

“Why not simply tell her that you want your husband in your bed? Is she as easily shocked as your septa?”

Catelyn laughed again. “She is a married woman, my lord. She knows more than Septa Mordane of what passes between husband and wife.” She sighed a little through her nose then, and Lysa could picture her biting her lip before she spoke again in a voice laden with sympathy. “But I fear Lysa has not found the same joy in her marriage as I have, my lord. She has lost all those sweet babes, and while I do not doubt that Jon Arryn is a good husband to her, she does not love him, Ned. Perhaps, if she had either children or the love of her husband, she could be more content. But she is so unhappy, my love! I can see it in her face and hear it in her voice every time she looks at our children. How can I throw it in her face that I have everything she lacks?”

Lysa stood rooted to the ground, cheeks flaming with both shame and anger. _She pities me? How dare Cat pity me? I am Lady of the Eyrie, wife to the Hand of the King! She’s stuck here in this frigid wasteland growing old and cold while I am respected at court and dine with the King and Queen. She doesn’t want this life or that man! She wanted Petyr once, but he chose me in the end. She never had him, but I did. How dare she pity me!_

She turned and fled back to the Great Keep without ever entering the sept. _I will pray for you there ten times on the morrow,_ she promised her unborn babe. 

She spent the rest of the day in the ugly rooms she’d been given. _Everything is ugly here. Too much grey. Not enough color._ She sent word to Cat that she didn’t feel quite well and preferred to be left alone to rest. Cat came to her room as soon as she got the message, of course, but Lysa sent her away without letting her in. Then she sent that awful maester, but Lysa sent him away, too.

She passed the hours talking to her unborn babe--still too small to be felt or seen, but more real to her and far more important than anyone in this godsforsaken wasteland or anywhere else. She promised him she’d keep him safe. That he would be the Lord of the Eyrie and all the Vale, and no one would ever pity him or take anything away from him. She told him all the ways he was better than his Stark cousins who had to share their table with their shameful father’s bastard, poor things, and how he must always be kind to his poor Aunt Cat who had not married quite so highly as herself, and whose husband had shamed her.

By the time evening arrived and Catelyn came again to her door, this time bearing food from the evening meal, Lysa felt quite sorry for her sister’s terrible lot in life. _I do not envy her. There is no reason to envy her. I needn’t envy her even the children now, for in less than nine moons, you shall be here, my sweetling._ She allowed Cat to come in, smiling and embracing her sister warmly, assuring her she felt much better, and thinking that she’d allow Cat to remain with her as long as she liked in order to avoid Lord Stark’s odious attentions. _Practically forcing himself upon her in a sept! Poor Cat!_

They spoke of inconsequential things and even laughed a bit, and Lysa began to feel almost happy. Cat was not with child. She’d heard her sister’s chambermaid speaking to some older woman about it. She’d expressed surprise that Lady Stark wasn’t with child again as often as Lord Stark was in her chambers. _Poor Cat!_ The older woman had said something about the difficulty of Catelyn’s last time in childbed and that perhaps their lady couldn’t bear any more children. _Poor Cat!_

“Lysa? Are you well?” Catelyn’s voice interrupted her thoughts, and Lysa realized she had lost track of the conversation. She looked up to see her sister’s face filled with concern and . . . .pity? _No,_ she thought. _She is the one to be pitied._

She smiled at Catelyn and said sweetly, “I am more than well, Cat. I only worry for you here in such a cold place. You were never meant for the cold.”

“No,” Cat admitted with a smile. “But the Great Keep is warm, and I have found much joy in my children and . . .” She bit her lip and stopped speaking, looking almost distressed for a moment. Lysa wondered if she worried about not being able to have any more children. “You will have children who bring you joy, too, Lysa,” Cat said firmly. “I am certain of it.”

Suddenly, Lysa needed her sister to know just how certain she could be of that. She needed her sister to know how blessed Lysa truly was. _My silly words can’t hurt you, sweetling,_ she whispered silently to her babe. _You are stronger than all the others. I know it._

“You need have no doubt of that, Cat,” she said smiling more broadly than ever. “Can I tell you a secret?”


	42. Rush Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for this tumblr prompt: "Ned/cat - can we pretend I didn't just say that?"
> 
> Modern Drabble in which college freshman Catelyn Tully is dragged to a fraternity rush party and meets the Stark brothers.

“Cersei, do we have to do this?”

“Yes, Cat. We have to. If you intend to have any fun at all in college, you have to get into the right sorority, do you understand me?”

Catelyn Tully looked around at the people jammed into every available bit of space on the front lawn of the old house in front of them and sighed. She wasn’t entirely certain that this type of fun was going to appeal to her at all. The blonde girl beside her noted her hesitation and gave her a withering look.

“Don’t make me regret bringing you, Catelyn Tully.”

 _Why not? I already regret your bringing me._ Cersei Lannister wasn’t even her friend, really, but she was the only person Catelyn knew here. She’d wanted to go away for college and didn’t really regret her decision to be so far from home, but she was seriously questioning whatever had possessed her to allow Cersei Lannister to talk her into rushing.

“This isn’t a sorority rush event,” she said. “It’s a frat party. They’re rushing the freshman boys here, not us.”

Cersei rolled her eyes. “Why do I even bother with you? If you were any more helpless, you’d be hopeless.” She pulled Catelyn over to one side of the lawn. “Now, listen carefully. This is the best fraternity on campus. If the guys here really like you, you can pretty much guarantee yourself a bid to any sorority you want. Do you understand?”

Catelyn nodded.

“Now, ignore the freshman guys. There just trying to impress the frat members, and they can’t do you any good. If you can get a junior or senior to take an interest in you, that’s the best. Or somebody really popular.” She scanned the crowd on the lawn. “Like him!” she pronounced, pointing to a broad shouldered, good looking black-haired boy who towered above the people he stood with. Catelyn figured he had to be at least 6’5”. “But I’m taking him,” Cersei said definitively.

“You know him?”

“No. But I know he is. He’s just a sophomore, but he’s going to start at quarterback this year. His name’s Robert Baratheon, and he’s more or less the king of the campus thanks to that arm of his. He can move as well as throw, and my brother says he can take a hit and still keep going. He should be a three-year starter, and that’s a big deal.”

“Uh-huh,” Catelyn said as if she had the slightest idea what Cersei was talking about. She didn’t really understand football, but Cersei’s twin brother played it, and if Jaime Lannister was interested in something, so was Cersei. “And you think King Whatever-His-Name-Is will be interested in you?”

“Of course,” Cersei said with a confident smile. “Watch and learn, little Cat. Watch and learn.” With that, Cersei sauntered off toward the tall guy and his friends and left Catelyn standing there.

“Wonderful,” she said out loud. “Just wonderful.”

“What’s wonderful?”

Startled, she whirled around to see an alarmingly good looking guy with dark brown hair and lively grey eyes staring down at her with a lazy grin on his face. He was very tall, not as tall as that giant Cersei had set out to snare, but easily over six feet. “Oh . . .nothing,” she stammered. “I was just . . .thinking out loud.”

“Well, I’m happy you’re thinking such wonderful thoughts.” He stuck out his hand. “Brandon Stark,” he said. “President of this group of delinquents. And you are?”

“Catelyn. Cat. Cat Tully.” _God, Cat! Remember how to talk already!_

“Freshman, right?” he said, and laughed a bit when she nodded. “Well, you’ve definitely improved the scenery on campus by choosing to attend here. For that, I thank you, Cat Tully.”

She laughed then, even as she felt her cheeks redden slightly. “Thank you,” she said.

“Whatcha drinking, Cat?” he asked her.

“Nothing. I . . .just got here.”

“Well, we’ll have to do something about that. Let’s see . . .”

“Brandon! Where’s your beer, man?” another boy shouted as he came up to them.

“Empty, sadly,” Brandon responded.

“Here! Take this one! It’s full and I can get another.” 

The boy handed Brandon his beer, and Brandon clapped him on the back saying, “Thanks, man!” before taking a big swig of it.

“Friend of yours?” Catelyn asked.

“Not a clue who he is,” Brandon responded.

“Do strangers frequently come up and give you their drinks?”

He laughed. “During rush they do. He’s a freshman, Cat. He wants to get into my fraternity. If I told him I liked his shirt, he’d take it off and give it to me.” He put an arm around her shoulders. “But we were getting you a drink.”

“I don’t really like beer.”

“No, I figured you for more of a punch person,” he smiled. “This way.”

She allowed him to steer her through the crowd and noted that virtually everyone called out to him by name as they passed. She wondered how Cersei was doing with her football star, and half hoped to run into her. She imagined she looked far less helpless and hopeless with the fraternity president’s arm draped over her shoulders.

“Punch?” she asked him as they walked. “You are seriously serving fruit punch?”

“You’re cute, Kitty-Cat. It tastes like punch, anyway. Sort of. Really sweet and fruity. But with a kick.”

“A kick . . .”

“Yeah.” He stopped and faced her, looking her up and down in a manner that made her suddenly feel like she wasn’t wearing any clothes, but before she could get angry at him, he looked back at her face and sighed. “Look, I’m probably going to want to kick myself in the head for this in another couple of hours, but you seem like a nice girl. Don’t drink more than one glass of that punch, no matter how hot you get or how good it tastes, okay?”

She just looked at him.

“It’s got enough booze in it to make anybody ready to get naked and get busy with just about anybody else.”

“Oh!” she exclaimed, flushing deeply red again.

He laughed loudly, and it struck her that the handsome Brandon Stark had already had a fair amount to drink, himself. “Just stick around for a few hours, and you’ll see what I mean. But go really easy on the punch.”

They actually made it inside the house now, and he steered over to a huge bar area where a couple of guys were serving beer out of kegs and some red liquid that Catelyn assumed was the punch out of what looked like big trash cans.

“Ned!” Brandon shouted out, and one of the guys behind the bar looked up. “Take really good care of this one, will you?”

The boy called Ned looked from Brandon to her, and Catelyn realized that they looked rather alike. Ned was shorter and a little broader through the shoulders. He didn’t have Brandon’s movie star looks, either, although she couldn’t truly see all of his face because he wore a closely shaved beard. 

“Brandon! Are you going to leave me lonely and thirsty all night?” 

A feminine voice called down from somewhere up above, and Catelyn looked up to see a very tall dark haired girl leaning over the railing of the second floor.

Brandon grinned up at the girl. “Not on your life, Barb!” he called cheerfully. “Be good, Cat!” he said to Catelyn, giving her shoulder a squeeze before he bounded up the steps and disappeared somewhere with the dark haired girl.

 _I guess he was only showing me where the drinks are,_ Catelyn thought, feeling vaguely disappointed.

She walked over to the bar area, where the boy who looked like Brandon had already gone back to filling cups and handing them out to the seemingly endless procession of hands reaching for them. Feeling very self-conscious again, she cleared her throat. “Ned?” she asked. “That’s your name, right?”

“Yeah, I’m . .” he looked up at her then and stopped talking--just staring at her. Cat noted that his eyes were exactly like Brandon’s, but unlike Brandon‘s, they remained focused on her face. 

When he didn’t say anything else, she said, “You’re um, Brandon’s brother, aren’t you?”

“What? Oh, yeah. Ned Stark. Also known as Brandon’s little brother.” He swallowed. “Sorry. I just . . Uh, you want a drink?”

“Well, Brandon told me not to have more than one glass of the punch.”

Ned’s grey eyes opened widely at that. “Seriously?” he said in disbelieving tones.

“Yes. Why?”

“Oh, it’s just that when Brandon asks me to take care of a girl at the bar, he generally means he wants me to give her all the punch she’ll drink.”

Catelyn couldn’t say what her face looked like after that comment, but it had a profound effect on Ned Stark who immediately put down the beer he was filling and put his hands over his face. “Oh, Jesus. I’m sorry. Look, can we pretend I didn’t just say that?”

He looked embarrassed and miserable, and she found herself feeling sorry for him. “Sure,” she said. “And I just met your brother, Ned. And I just saw him run upstairs to answer what I’m pretty sure was a booty call, so. . .Don’t worry about what you said, okay?”

Ned shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Only Brandon,” he said. “So, do you want one glass of punch?”

Catelyn looked dubiously at the red mixture in the trash can. “I’m thinking no,” she said. “Is there anything other than beer and this stuff?”

He looked at her. “Come on,” he said. Turning to the guy serving drinks next to him, he said, “You’ve got this for the next ten minutes and then the next two guys are up. Okay?”

The other bartender gave him a rather unhappy look, but nodded, and Ned came around the bar to join Catelyn. “Sometimes it’s a good thing to be Brandon’s brother. I don’t get questioned very often.”

“And do you deserve to be questioned very often?”

He looked down and smiled a little. “Probably not.” He nodded back through a doorway. “This way,” he said. 

She followed him, wondering what it was about college that had her suddenly blindly following guys she didn’t know through a frat house. She supposed it was simply the result of feeling so completely at a loss. Ned Stark led her to an old refrigerator and opened it up. “Coke, Sprite, or Mountain Dew. Sorry, no Diet.”

“Sprite,” she said gratefully.

He grabbed two and handed her one of them. “Is it okay if we go outside? It’s ungodly hot in here.”

“It’s pretty hot outside, too, I’m afraid,” she told him, “but at least the air moves.”

“It’s always too hot here as far as I’m concerned,” he said. “Why I let Brandon talk me into coming south for school, I’ll never know.”

“You’re from up north, then?”

“Yep, about as far north as it gets.” He led her through a screen door to a courtyard area behind the house that seemed remarkably unoccupied. 

It only seemed unoccupied, however. As she and Ned walked around a corner, they came upon a guy sitting on a bench leaning back against a wall with his mouth hanging open and an odd expression on his face.

“Jesus Christ, Robert!” Ned exclaimed, shaking his head and moving to stand in front of Catelyn and turn her back around the way they’d came.

She’d seen the girl kneeling in front of the guy with her head between his legs, though, and she’d recognized the long golden hair.

Her cheeks were on fire as Ned hurried her away, and she heard a booming laugh ring out behind them. “You just have to wait your turn, Ned!” she heard a male voice call. “You can bring your redhead back in about twenty minutes!”

She and Ned didn’t stop walking until they had gone through a gate at the back and left the courtyard.

“Where are we?” Catelyn asked, thoroughly disconcerted by the fact that it was now dark and she was on a part of campus she didn’t know well with a guy she didn’t know at all.

“Fifth Street,” he answered without hesitation. “It runs along behind Fraternity Row. If we follow it that way, it dead ends onto Martin which takes us right up to the freshman dorms. Are you in one of the freshman dorms?”

Catelyn bit her lip, wondering why this guy was so anxious to get to her dorm. Ned looked at her for a long moment. 

“Oh, shit,” he said finally. “You don’t think I . . .I mean back there . . .what Robert said . . .I wasn’t . . .I mean, I wouldn’t . . . I was hot, and it’s usually cooler back there and . . .”

“It’s all right, Ned,” she said, laughing and actually putting a hand on his arm. She couldn’t imagine not believing him. His face was so serious and yet so unbelievably distressed at the same time.

“I . . .I’m sorry,” he said.

“You didn’t do anything wrong.” She twisted her mouth. “I’m the idiot who wandered into a dark, secluded corned of a courtyard with a man I don’t know.”

“I would never . . .”

“I believe you. But you have to admit, it wasn’t very bright on my part.”

“Well, coming here by yourself was probably you’re first mistake, to be honest. There are a lot of perfectly nice people here, but there plenty of the other sort, too. And, well, freshman girls . . .They‘re easy to take advantage of.”

“Yeah. So I gather.” She sighed. “I didn’t come here alone. But the girl I came with is now otherwise occupied.” 

She gave him a meaningful look and then glanced back toward the courtyard.

“Oh, no,” he said slowly. “Are you serious?”

“Yep,” she said, laughing in spite of herself. “Although in that particular case, I’m not certain which of the two is being taken advantage of.”

“That’s because you don’t know Robert.

“Oh, but you don’t know Cersei!”

The two of them laughed then, and she said. “I think I should go on back to my room now, Ned. I’m afraid I’m not really much for this kind of party.”

“Me neither. I only pledged last year because of Brandon. He graduates this year, and I may not even stay in the fraternity after that. Of course, Robert will argue with me on that.” He was silent a moment as if thinking, and then he sort of shook himself. “Anyway, I’d really like you to consider letting me walk you back to your dorm. It’s pretty well lit all the way back from here, but there’s a lot of drinking and a lot of stupid behavior during rush week so . . .I just don’t want you to walk alone.”

She smiled at him. “You Starks seem to have a protective streak. Your brother wants to keep me sober and you want to keep me safe.”

“Yeah. About that,” he said. “What I said about Brandon earlier . . .he’s really a good guy. He just . . .likes to party. But if you like him . . .I mean, he obviously likes you, and you shouldn’t let some stupid comment of mine affect your opinion of him.”

“He likes me? What makes you say that?” 

“Because he’s pretty drunk tonight. And he’s doing his whole “frat president” big man thing tonight. But neither of those things made him try to score with you, and I saw how he looked at you. So, he must actually like you.”

“And I’m supposed to think that makes sense?”

Ned laughed. “Well . . .let’s just say I have a certain expertise in understanding Brandon. You can trust my opinion on this one. But am I walking you back to your dorm?”

“Yeah. I feel kind of bad about leaving Cersei, though.”

“Cersei?”

“The blonde with your friend.”

“Oh yeah. Well, I can go back and get her to come with us if you like.” He didn’t look at all enthused at the prospect, and Catelyn was impressed he even made the offer. 

“Hang on,” she said, getting out her phone. 

“You think she’s going to stop what she’s doing to answer a text?” Ned said doubtfully. 

“Not texting her.” She finished punching in the message and looked up at him. “I texted her brother Jaime.”

“You told that poor girl’s brother she’s giving a guy a blow job at a frat party?!?” Ned looked at her as if she’d lost her mind.

“No. I texted him that she wanted to stay at this party awhile because she’s having fun and I want to go home, so can he text her in an hour and see if she’s ready to leave yet.” She smiled at him. “Cersei’s been calling Jaime to come get her when she’s drunk since she was fourteen. He always takes care of her. They’re really close. He won’t let anything happen to her.”

“If you say so. So, I’m walking you home then?”

“Please.”

They didn’t talk much as they walked as Catelyn was more or less lost in her own thoughts and she had figured out that Ned didn’t talk much at all unless she asked him a question. She wondered if he was right about his brother. She had never met anybody quite as good looking as Brandon Stark. Could somebody like him really be interested in her? Then she remembered the way he’d gone upstairs with the dark haired girl and wondered if she really wanted him to be interested in her. He was confusing.

“Oh!” she said suddenly. “We’re here!” She smiled at Ned. “Thanks for walking with me.” She held up her empty soda can. “And thanks for the Sprite. If yours is empty, I’ll take it in and throw it away for you.”

“Thanks,” he said, handing her the can. He stood there looking at her again. He seemed to do that a lot, and Catelyn felt her cheeks flush a bit under his serious gaze.

“Ned?” she said.

“Oh!” He looked embarrassed. “Well, it was nice meeting you . . .oh, wow . . I don’t even know your name!”

She smiled at him. “I’m Cat. Catelyn Tully.”

“Ned Stark,” he said, holding out his hand.

“I know,” she laughed, as she shook his offered hand.

“Yeah, well I figured I owed you a proper introduction since that’s just one more thing I screwed up with you tonight.”

“I think you’ve been great tonight. You’re a nice guy, Ned.”

He hadn’t let go of her hand, and Catelyn found she was in no hurry for him to do so. He was staring at her again.

“Why do you keep looking at me like that?” she asked.

“Because you’re perfect,” he said without hesitating. Then he jerked his hand back as he seemed to realize what he’d said. “Can we pretend I didn’t just say that?” he asked her, shaking his head. 

She laughed. “Sorry. I’m only willing to pretend to forget one comment per person today, and you’ve used yours up already.”

“Ah,” he said. “Guess I’ll have to live with it then.” He looked at her again, and she thought she’d never had anyone look at her quite so intently before. “And while I’d give my right arm to have kept that thought to myself--it’s the truth.”

Before she could say anything to that, he smiled. “Good night, Cat.” Then he turned and walked back up the street at a rather brisk pace.

“Good night, Ned!” she called after him.

She sat in her dorm room for a long time after that thinking about the evening, and she decided that she would likely forget Brandon Stark’s heartstopping grin long before she forgot that Ned Stark had called her perfect.


	43. I'll Never Unsee That!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this fic was written in response to this tumblr prompt: I'll never unsee that." You already know who and your choice of the unfortunate Stark kid(s) or whoever else for that matter. 
> 
> A Modern AU in which Robb and Jon see something they'd rather not have seen, and then learn they aren't the first people in the family this has happened to!

Jon Snow tipped back his beer and feigned interest in Bran’s monologue about whatever constellation he was going on about. Astronomy was his twelve year old cousin’s latest obsession, and Jon was certain he could teach a course on it in any university. He was equally certain that after spending a month here at Winterfell listening to his cousin, he would not be signing up for astronomy when he returned to college in the fall.

“See? Right there, Robb. No. You need to look more to your left.” Bran had handed Robb the binoculars and was directing him to point them in the direction of a particularly bright star that was apparently actually a planet or something. 

Robb was obediently gazing skyward through the lenses, and Jon felt a bit guilty about his inattention. Robb hated the stargazing bit even more than he did, but he did it for Bran. It was only the second summer back at the Stark family retreat since Bran’s accident had put him in that chair, and the poor kid’s inability to run and climb and hike for hours in the woods like he used to do here made everybody feel bad for him. 

“Give me a turn, Stark,” Jon said, reaching for the binoculars. “I want to see what it looks like through those, too.”

Acting the fool, Robb kept binoculars up to his eyes and swiveled to look at Jon. “Oh god!” he said with disgust. “It looks horrible!” 

Jon threw his empty beer can at him, and Bran laughed, but as Robb turned his head back toward the sky, he suddenly stopped, staring intently through the lenses into the woods in the direction of the hot springs.

“What the fuck?” he growled angrily. He stared for a moment and then slammed the binoculars down. “I will kill the little son of a bitch!”

“What are you talking about?” Jon asked him, startled.

“That little Baratheon shit! Sansa went out with him tonight, didn’t she?”

“Yeah . . .they left about an hour ago,” Bran said.

“No, they didn’t!” Robb said furiously. “They’re right down there!” He waved his arm angrily toward where he’d been looking through the binoculars.

“I can’t see anything down there, Robb. It’s dark. And Bran’s right. Sansa and Joffrey left right after your parents did. I saw them drive off in that little sports car of his.”

Robb looked thunderous. “I saw her, Jon! Down there on the path to the hot springs. You know the one. It snakes around from the overlook and you can hardly see it from the house at all. You can just see a tiny bit of it there!” He pointed angrily. “And two people just walked through there holding hands.”

Jon frowned. Technically the path was on the Starks’ property, but the family was only up here in the summers and on occasional holidays. He knew local kids hiked all over here and went skinny dipping in the hot springs. “It’s dark, Robb. You can’t possibly have seen more than two dark blobs. What makes you think it’s Sansa?”

“Her hair!” Robb exploded. He grabbed a handful of his own coppery mane which did seem to glow in the moonlight. “You think I don’t know how this stuff glows in the dark? And you name me another girl in this town who’s got this hair hanging down her back nearly to her butt!”

Jon sighed. “I guess they could have driven to the overlook and decided to walk to the springs from there.”

“And why the hell would that shit take her all the way to the overlook just to backtrack to the pools when you can walk it in half the time from here? Unless he didn’t want us to know where he was taking her!” Robb was working himself into a fury. “Come on, Jon! There’s only one reason to sneak down to those springs at night! You had Ygritte up here last summer. Don’t tell me you didn’t . . .”

“Aw, shit!” Jon said, recalling very clearly what he and Ygritte had done at the hot springs. He shook his head. “But . . .Sansa’s only . . .”

“Sixteen! I know! And I’m not gonna just stand here and let that little Baratheon prick talk her into something she’ll regret.” With that, he started off in the direction of the path. When he’d gone about twenty steps are turned around. “So are you coming, Snow?”

Jon sighed. “Yeah. I’m coming.” He turned to Bran. “We’ll be back, Bran . . .we’re just going to . . .”

Bran rolled his eyes. “I know what you’re talking about, Jon. I’m twelve, not two. And I’m not stupid.” He made a face. “But if Sansa’s really taking her clothes off with that guy, then she is!”

Jon nearly laughed regardless of the situation. “Yeah, little cuz. I agree with you there.”

“Come on, Snow!” Robb yelled impatiently, and Jon turned away from Bran and jogged to catch up with him.

“I’m sure it’s not what you think,” he said he jogged along beside Robb.

Robb didn’t answer and his blue eyes looked murderous. Jon began to worry a bit. Robb wasn’t just his cousin. He was his best friend in the world, and he was ordinarily the most easygoing guy on the planet. But he didn’t react well to anyone fucking with his family. Jon grimaced inwardly at his own choice of words and prayed they would not find Joffrey doing anything of the sort with Sansa or Robb would likely kill him.

Robb’s only school suspension ever had come in the seventh grade when he’d caught two kids holding Jon up against the wall and telling him he was a piece of trash that didn’t have a dad and his mother was a whore. They’d been calling him a variety of stupid names, all variations on his last name (which, he had to admit, was made up in the first place--his mother, for reasons she’d never explained to him, had decided she wouldn’t have him be a Stark or a Targaryen and had legally changed her own last name to Snow before he’d been born and then refused to put his dad on the birth certificate). Robb had beaten both boys senseless and gotten a three day suspension for it. If he’d done that because a couple thirteen year old assholes called his cousin mean names, what the hell would he do if he saw Joffrey-Dickhead-Baratheon fucking his sister?

When they got close to the hot springs, he grabbed Robb’s arm. “Slow down, Stark. We don’t need to charge in like a couple of bulls. Let’s see what’s going on?”

Robb looked grim, but he nodded. Jon stepped a little ahead of him to lead the way around the last curve before the trees opened up into the big flat where the hot springs bubbled up. There were little springs all over the place, but three biggest pools--the ones good for swimming or whatever--were not far from the end of the path.

“Oh, god,” he heard Robb whisper and he turned back to see a grimace of absolute pain on his cousin’s face. At first he was confused, but then he heard it--the unmistakable sounds of two people going at it beyond the trees up ahead.

“Let me go,” Jon said. “Just . . .wait a minute, Robb. Please.”

Robb’s jaw was clenched, but he nodded, and Jon walked slowly around the last curve with a sick feeling in his stomach.

The sight that met his eyes made him see red. Literally. Her long, auburn hair swayed back and forth across her back as she bounced up and down. She was completely naked with her back to him, straddling the guy as he lay on some blanket, and fucking him for all she was worth. He’d almost reached out to grab her off him when his eyes registered what he was actually seeing.

Those legs sticking out from under her looked nothing like Joffrey Baratheon’s skinny legs, and they were covered with far more hair. And Sansa . . . _not Sansa, oh god, that’s not Sansa!_ . . .Too late, Jon realized who else had hair the color of Robb’s and the length of Sansa’s. He just never thought of her as a ‘girl.’

“Oh, Jesus,” he muttered under his breath, standing there rooted to the ground and wishing it would swallow him up just as his aunt threw her head back and cried out his uncle’s name.

“What the fuck?” came a shout from behind him. Then, a strangled “Mom?!?” and he turned to see Robb behind him white as a sheet in the moonlight and staring at the scene before him with an expression of utmost horror. 

Aunt Cat cried out again, although this one sounded very different than her last, and without thinking Robb turned to see that she had gotten to her knees and was facing her son with her hands over her mouth and a rather horrified expression on her own face. Realizing that he now had a completely unobstructed view of his aunt’s breasts, Jon thought she could put her hands to better use covering just about anything other than her mouth. 

“I’ll never unsee that,” he heard Robb almost whimper behind him.

Uncle Ned was on his feet then and he’d jerked the blanket off the ground, stepping in front of Aunt Cat to cover her up and giving the boys a clear view of his naked ass as he did so. He then whirled around angrily to face them, and Jon kept his eyes diligently on his uncle’s face, not remotely wanting to see anything more below his waist considering what they’d interrupted.

“Get out of here, boys!” Uncle Ned growled at them, his voice sounding an octave lower even than its usual pitch. “Go now.”

Jon had the uncomfortable impression that Aunt Cat had started crying as he grabbed Robb and pulled him back toward the path. “Come on, Stark. Let’s get out of here.”

Robb looked shellshocked as Jon pulled him along by the arm. “I’ll never unsee that,” he said again, shaking his head. They walked along in silence, both eager to put as much distance between themselves and that particular memory, until they heard a shout.

“Jon! Robb!”

Startled by the sound of their names, Jon looked up to see his fourteen year old cousin Arya bounding toward them. “You don’t want to go . . .” she started to say, but then she caught sight of Robb’s face. “Oh fuck. I’m too late, aren’t I? You caught them at it.” She shook her head. “I knew you’d freak the fuck out about it.”

Robb swallowed. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he said, trying to push past her and move on toward the house.

Arya laughed out loud then. “My god, Robb, it’s just sex! I mean you’re in college. It’s not like you haven’t . . .”

Robb turned around then, and the look he gave Arya made Jon think he might honestly murder his fourteen year old sister.

“Shut up, Arya,” he hissed at her. “You don’t understand. It wasn’t . . .”

“Sansa? Of course not, Jon!” She rolled her eyes. “Boys are such idiots! If Sansa ever does have sex, she won’t do it outside where her clothes might get dirty. And Mom and Dad have been sneaking down here for years!”

Robb groaned, and Arya laughed again. “You do look bad, Robb. Did you catch Mom blowing him or something?”

Jon hadn’t thought Robb could go any paler, but he did. “What the? Shut your goddamn filthy mouth, Arya. Why the hell would you say something like that?” he demanded of his sister.

“Because that’s what they were doing the first time I caught them.”

Robb made a strangled sound. “I’m gonna throw up,” he muttered. And then he simply dropped down and sat on the grass as if he lacked the will to go the last hundred yards up to the house.

Arya actually threw herself on the ground then cackling like a hyena at her brother’s discomfort, and Jon found his own mouth twitching. Yeah, he’d been shocked and could have done without the image of his aunt bouncing up and down on his uncle emblazoned on his retinas, but Robb truly did look like his world had ended.

“Honestly, Robb,” she said after she quit laughing. “You did realize they had to do it at least five times, didn’t you?”

“I don’t want to think about it,” Robb said, shaking his head slowly. “I mean, Jesus, Arya. She’s our mother!”

Arya shrugged. “Well, I hope so. I’d hate to think Dad was screwing some other woman at the hot springs.”

Jon did laugh at that, ignoring the betrayed look Robb shot him. “But what do you know about sex anyway, little cousin?” he asked her, sitting down himself to grab her in a headlock and mess up her hair.

She rolled her eyes again. “Just because I’ve never done anything doesn’t mean I don’t know anything," she informed him. "I got the sex talk from Mom when I was eight, actually.”

“Eight?” Robb repeated, apparently forgetting his emotional crisis over the unfairness that his parents had apparently seen fit to share the facts of life with Arya at a considerably younger age than with himself.

She nodded. “She didn’t have much of a choice, Robb. That’s how old I was when I caught them. They didn’t see me, though. I stayed hidden. Only I kept thinking about it, so the next day I asked Mom why anyone would do something like that and whether or not it tasted bad.”

“Shit, Arya!” Jon said, shaking his head as he tried and failed to imagine the expression on his very proper aunt’s face when presented with that question. Of course, he’d now seen his very proper aunt . . . _Nope! Not going there!_ He shut his eyes against the image.

“She was really good about it, actually,” Arya said. “I mean, she was embarrassed and kind of mad at me for spying on them, but . . .mostly she just answered my questions.” She shrugged. “She always answers our questions, you know. Sansa’s and mine, I mean. She’d probably answer yours, too, if you weren’t so weird about the idea of your mother knowing anything.” She grinned evilly. “Or doing anything.”

Robb shook his head. “It was hard enough getting that talk from Dad when I was twelve or whatever.”

“Well, duh!” Arya said. “Dad was probably as awkward about it as you are!” She rolled her eyes yet again. “Boys!”

“We probably ought to get back up to the house,” Jon said. “Did you just run off and leave Rickon?”

“I left him with Bran. And no, I didn’t tell Bran what you’d find at the hot springs. He’d probably be as big an idiot about it as Robb.”

“Well, you have to admit it’s kind of shocking,” Robb said defensively as he stood up.

“Robb! How many times have you walked in on them kissing? Or looking at each other all goofy? Or snuggled up together?” She sighed. “You didn’t really think they stopped doing it after Rickon was born, did you?”

I . . .it’s just . . .They were outside, Arya! Out in the open just going at it like . . .” He swallowed and put his face in his hands. “I will never unsee that.”

“Maybe it’s better just to see it when you’re too young to get so weirded out,” she said. “Sansa did way better with it than this.” With that offhand comment, she turned and continued the trek up to the house.

“Hold on!” Robb called after her. “Are you saying Sansa caught them, too?”

She didn’t stop walking, and Robb put a hand on her arm. Slowly she turned around and looked up at Robb and then at Jon. “I sort of took her there,” she admitted guiltily. “I was a rotten kid.”

“You did what?” Jon asked her.

Arya swallowed and had the good grace to look embarrassed. “Do you remember the summer I was grounded for two weeks and you two kept asking me what I did? And your mom got all mad at my parents telling them that no nine year old could deserve to be punished so long?” 

She looked at Jon as she said that last, and he did remember. His mother had been livid at Uncle Ned and Aunt Cat for not letting Arya come with her to some horse show during that two weeks and even madder that she couldn’t get anyone, including Arya, to tell her why her favorite niece was in trouble in the first place. “You were about ten then, right?” Jon said.

“Nine,” Arya said, starting to walk again. Robb and Jon fell in beside her as she continued speaking. “It was the summer after I caught Mom and Dad down at the springs. Anyway, Sansa brought her friend Jeyne that summer, and they kept sneaking off and whispering and giggling and telling me I was too little and too stupid to be a part of their dumb conversations. But I knew they were talking about boys and kissing all the time.”

They reached the back patio, and Jon was relieved to see that Bran had gone in. Likely he was with Rickon. Arya sat down on one of the patio chairs and looked up at them. “Mom and Dad didn’t used to drive to the overlook. When we were little, they just waited for us to fall asleep and walked down from here. That’s how I found them that first time. I saw them walking down through the yard from my window and I followed them. That next year when I was so mad at Sansa and Jeyne for treating me like a stupid baby, I saw them sneak out again.” She swallowed. “And so I went to Sansa’s room and told them I could show them how grownups really kissed if they weren’t too scared to come, and I took them down there and we saw Mom and Dad . . .doing . . .it.” Jon was amused to see that even Arya looked embarrassed now.

“You got a different lesson that time, did you?” he teased her, as he and Robb sat down as well.

“Christ, Jon, you’re talking about my parents!” Robb objected.

“Um, yeah,” Arya admitted. “And stupid Sansa made a noise, and we got caught. And she got her sex talk and I got grounded for two weeks.” She looked up at her brother and cousin rather shamefacedly. “And I’ve pretty much stayed the hell away from the hot springs ever since. “Especially when you two started bringing girls around! I mean, hell! The place is never safe!”

At the sound of a car pulling into the driveway, Arya jumped up. “That’ll be Mom and Dad, and if I’m here they’re gonna think I sent you down there or something! See ya, guys!” Without another word, she bolted into the house.

“Should we go with her?” Jon asked his cousin.

“Might as well get this over with,” Robb said. “Or maybe they’ll just go in through the garage and stay in the house, and we’ll all forget this ever happened.”

“I thought you would never unsee it,” Jon said, grinning at him in spite of the dreadful suspicion that he’d never unsee it either.

“I won’t,” Robb said miserably. “But it’s not like I can avoid looking at my parents for the rest of my life, so . . .”

“Hello, boys.” Uncle Ned’s deep voice hailed them quietly from the direction of the driveway, and Jon looked up to see Uncle Ned and Aunt Cat, both fully clothed, thank God, walking toward them hand in hand.

Robb just looked down, and Jon saw his aunt bite her lip and hold his uncle’s hand a bit tighter. It occurred to him that her even walking back here to see them was pretty brave. “Hi Uncle Ned. Hi Aunt Cat,” he forced himself to say.

Both of them looked at him then, and while Jon could see the color in his aunt’s cheeks even in the moonlight, they both met his eyes. 

Uncle Ned cleared his throat. “Obviously, we didn’t expect to see the two of you down at the hot springs this evening.”

Jon actually barked out a laugh at that. “Yeah . . .well we didn’t expect to see you there, either.”

“Robb?” Aunt Cat said softly. “Are you all right?”

Robb nodded, unable to look up and meet his mother’s eyes.

She sighed. “Look at me, Robb,” she said in that tone of hers which somehow managed to remain gentle but allow no refusal, and Jon watched his cousin slowly lift his eyes. “I am your mother. Nothing has changed. I know you would prefer never having seen what you saw, and I would have preferred that as well, but it doesn’t change who we are, son.”

“You’re my mother,” Robb said in a quiet voice.

“I am,” she said, letting go of Uncle Ned’s hand to come and ruffle Robb’s hair. “I am also your father’s wife. And I am proud to be both.” She bent down to kiss the top of his head. “I’ll be upstairs, Ned,” she said as she stood back up.

Jon saw his uncle nod to her, and then she looked at him. “Good night, Jon,” she said with an embarrassed sort of smile. “Your mother will no doubt laugh herself silly over this story.”

Jon smiled back at her. “Only if you tell it, Aunt Cat. Because I won’t be telling it. I’m sorry we interrupted you.”

She looked down and bit her lip. “Thank you, Jon.”

“Good night, Aunt Cat.”

“Good night, Mom,” Robb said then. 

She smiled. “Good night, Robb.”

Once she’d gone, Uncle Ned let out a sigh. “Well, I suppose at your age I at least don’t have to explain to you two what you saw tonight.”

“Please don’t,” Robb said earnestly. “I’m trying very hard to forget it.”

Uncle Ned actually laughed. “Yes, well, I suppose I understand that. But, Robb, your mother and I are married, you know. And it just so happens that I love her very much.”

“I know,” Robb sighed. “I’d just rather skip the demonstration.”

“Would you two like a beer? You look like you could both use one,” Uncle Ned said then.

He didn’t make that offer very frequently as they were both still technically underage, and Jon felt guilty about the two beers they’d already taken from the refrigerator during Bran’s astronomy lesson earlier, but he and Robb both nodded.

Uncle Ned went inside and returned momentarily with two beers. 

“You aren’t having one?” Jon asked him.

He shook his head. “Your aunt will be waiting for me to tell her that I think you’re both fine.”

“Is she fine?” Jon asked.

Uncle Ned gave a half smile and sighed. “She’s embarrassed, Jon. She likely will be for some time. But she isn’t ashamed. She’ll be fine.”

“Good night, Uncle Ned.”

“Good night, Dad,” Robb said then. “I’m . . .sorry.”

Ned sighed. “It isn’t your fault, Robb. It just . . .happened.” He smiled ruefully at them. “I’m afraid that the older you children get . . .the more ‘aware’ you become . . .the more difficult it is to sneak away from you.”

Robb made a choking sort of sound, and Uncle Ned looked at Jon, grinning rather wickedly. “Perhaps I should start putting something on my bedroom doorknob to give you fair warning,” he said thoughtfully. “Do people still do that?”

“For Christ’s sake, Dad!” Robb protested. 

“Good night, boys!” Ned said, laughing as he left them there.

“I can’t believe he actually said that,” Robb said when he was gone.

“You know they’re probably going right up there to finish what they started at the hot springs, Stark,” Jon said, trying to get another reaction out of him.

To his surprise, Robb eyed him coolly. “Of course, they are!” he said. “They love each other. We should be so lucky.”

“Very mature attitude, Stark,” Jon said, raising his beer in salute.

“Yeah, well I’m trying, Snow, I’m trying,” Robb admitted, taking a healthy gulp of his own beer. “God! I’ll never unsee that!”


	44. Please Stay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the tumblr prompt: Ned/Cat, "please stay" 
> 
> Within the first year of their married life together at Winterfell, Hoster Tully sends an invitation for Catelyn and little Robb to make an extended visit to Riverrun. Ned suspects the man wishes to remove his daughter from the unpleasant experience of living with her husband's bastard and cannot truly fault him for that, but he also realizes that he does not want her to go.

Ned Stark read the missive from Riverrun through once more as if repeated perusals could change the words on the parchment or at least alter the not so thinly veiled motives for Lord Hoster’s invitation.

_An invitation issued to his daughter and grandson, Ned thought grimly. Not to me. I am not welcome in Riverrun, although the old man will never say it plainly._

Of course, Catelyn had written to her father on more than one occasion since her arrival at Winterfell, and Ned could hardly fault his lady wife if she had told the Lord of Riverrun about Jon’s presence here or about her dismay at the discovery her lord husband had brought a bastard home from war. While the beautiful young woman who now bore his name and had borne him a son was still a stranger to him in may ways, Ned thought it extremely unlikely she would have criticized him openly to her father. That type of disloyalty was not in her dutiful nature. But there was no denying that Catelyn had been very angry, and rightfully so. Nor was there any question that she remained sad and even hurt. It would appear that Old Hoster had picked up on that.

Hoster Tully’s concern for his daughter’s feelings didn’t surprise Ned. Nor did it make him angry, really. He’d gotten to know his goodfather a bit better than he knew his wife as they rode together in what was now being called Robert’s Rebellion. _Robert’s Rebellion,_ he thought bitterly. _It was Rhaegar’s rebellion against all decency and honor that put all of us on that battlefield and in this mess now._ Lord Hoster’s eyes had always shone with a special light when he spoke of his firstborn child, and it had been obvious to Ned that the man had a deep love and pride for the daughter who’d become Ned’s wife that went far beyond adherence to the words of House Tully. 

The two of them had celebrated together the letter informing Ned that Catelyn carried his child, and as he watched his goodfather drink far more ale than he likely should have, he was touched not only by the clear joy and pride the old man expressed, but by the concern for his daughter’s health and wellbeing that was even more clearly evident. It had caused him to like and respect the older man even more and led him to look forward to truly getting to know his wife with even greater anticipation.

He’d never anticipated what would occur after that. How could he? But he’d done what he must, and now Lord Tully was undoubtedly doing what he felt he must in order to spare his beloved daughter at least some measure of pain for whatever time he could manage. No, he couldn’t fault the man. But he damned well wasn’t happy about it.

 _Not now,_ he thought. _Not when we’ve finally started . . ._

Started what, exactly? He wished he knew. Catelyn was so dutiful, so determined to be the Lady of Winterfell in all aspects that sometimes he had difficulty knowing what she truly felt for him. If anything. In spite of her shocked anger at Jon’s presence at Winterfell, she’d come to him scarcely a fortnight later asking how long he intended to shame her by not coming to her bed. She was his lady wife, after all, and only she could bear him more trueborn heirs. He’d obliged her and that had been a far more uncomfortable experience even than when he’d taken her maidenhead having only just met her. Yet, somehow they had started to find little ways to be more comfortable with each other after that--both in her bedchamber and out of it, particularly over anything that concerned Robb.

 _Robb._ Ned’s heart warmed in a way he had never known possible every time he even thought of his son, and it had started to warm just a bit where his son’s mother was concerned as well. Then had come that terrible night when she’d asked him the name of Jon’s mother. _Was it Ashara Dayne, my lord? As the servants whisper?_ She’d looked half terrified there in her bed as she’d asked the question, and she’d been more than terrified by his response. He regretted bitterly the way he’d shouted at her, but he’d been stunned and unprepared for the question. He could not let her ask such questions. Not ever. For he did not know how he could look at the beautiful blue eyes in that entirely honest and blameless lovely face and speak anything other than the truth. He had preserved his secret that night, but he had crushed whatever tentative warmth had grown between them. He’d feared it crushed irrevocably.

He had been careful to be ever courteous and gentle toward her after that, showing her the greatest respect when she sat beside him at meals and in all other daily activities where both of them were required. Yet, he did not go again to her chambers and indeed avoided her when possible, not wanting to frighten her or ask of her anything she did not freely wish to give.

Yet, once again, his lady wife had surprised him. He recalled the conversation as clearly as the day it had taken place. She had come to find him in the godswood which had startled him as she had never come to the godswood before other than the day he had shown her around all the castle grounds after her arrival.

“Catelyn,” he’d said, concerned enough by her presence that he’d actually used her name rather than her honorific. “Is something amiss? Is Robb well?”

“Robb is well, my lord,” she’d answered, looking directly up into his face. His wife had the most direct manner of any woman he’d ever met, and it both pleased and disconcerted him at times. “But it is you who must tell me if something is amiss.”

“I do not understand, my lady.”

“You have forbidden me to speak of the bas . .of Jon Snow’s mother or question you about him at all. I have complied with your command and will continue to do so. I am uncertain what other cause I have given you to be displeased with me.”

Her voice had trembled slightly, but she hadn’t lowered her eyes, and Ned had felt shamed by her courage and her honesty. “No cause, my lady. You are not displeasing in any way. I would not have you believe otherwise.”

“And yet, still you shun my bed.”

“I . . .would not come to you unwelcome, my lady,” he’d said, stumbling over the words and wishing that the mere mention of her bed didn’t cause his pulse to quicken. 

“You are not unwelcome. You are my lord husband, and I would do my duty by you.”

Those words had slowed his heart quickly enough. “I know you would, my lady,” he’d said formally. “But I would not wish you to feel compelled to any action in your own home.” Suddenly, he couldn’t stand the coldness between them and he continued speaking. “Winterfell is your home now, and I wish you to consider it as such. Here before my gods, I swear that I intend to bring you no further shame.”

She’d looked at him for a long moment, appearing stunned by his words, and then she’d turned to look at the heart tree and he’d seen her shiver slightly. 

“Cold and forbidding gods, they seem to me, I’m afraid,” she’d said softly. “They do not know me. Nor I them.” She’d bit her lower lip and then said, “But I believe they are gods one would not swear before lightly, and I thank you for that, my lord.”

He’d nodded at her, realizing for the very first time precisely how isolated she must feel in Winterfell, without even her gods for company. She’d looked at him as if waiting for him to speak, but he’d had no more words after that declaration. None that he could speak to her.

Sighing after a moment, she’d said, “Very well, my lord. If you would keep that oath before your gods, then I would ask you to give me more trueborn children. I do not wish Robb to be alone because of any discord between us.”

The slight flush that had come to her cheeks had served to remind him how little his lady wife liked to ask for anything. She was a proud woman, Catelyn Tully, and he’d caused her to swallow that pride too many times in their brief marriage. “I would be honored by any children you would bear me, my lady. And I assure you, I wish there to be no discord between us.”

She’d nodded then and left the godswood without another word. 

He’d gone to her chambers that night and had discovered that something significant had changed between the two of them. He couldn’t identify precisely what it was, but he thought that his declaration in the godswood had touched her in some way that all his courtesy had not. He’d been ashamed to realize that his wife had truly needed some reassurance that he did not intend to dishonor her again, and he vowed to himself that he would prove himself true in that.

That had been eight days ago, and he had been to her chambers four times since then. In truth, he’d felt guilty about disturbing her so frequently, but he’d discovered that bedding her again only made him want her more. He supposed it was a good thing that he desired his wife as he had never desired another woman, but he wished he had more self-control for he did not wish to impose himself upon her more than she would want, whatever she told him. He did try to attend to her pleasure as well as he knew how for he wished her to find joy in their bedding. And she did seem to respond favorably to his touches, although he worried still that she might respond out of duty, and he knew himself to be far from well-versed in pleasing a woman. He swallowed and closed his eyes as the mere thought of his wife’s naked body and how he might try to please her caused his cock to become hard in his breeches.

 _Self-control,_ he thought ruefully. _When it comes to Catelyn, it would seem I have none._ He looked back down at the letter lying on his desk, and amorous thoughts quickly fled. For a brief moment, he considered simply burning the damn thing. But he knew he wouldn’t do that. One terrible lie lay between them already. He would not allow another. In all else, he was determined there would be honesty between himself and his lady wife. Honesty would perhaps in time allow trust. And if they could truly trust each other, then perhaps the tiny seed of warmth that he could feel growing between them once more could develop into something greater. She smiled at him with true warmth sometimes now when she came upon him bouncing Robb to make him laugh or when he filled her empty glass at dinner or offered her his arm when they walked together on the grounds. He found that he cherished those moments as much as the time he spent in her bed.

“My lord?” He looked up to see the woman who so occupied his thoughts standing in the doorway of his solar. “Vayon came to find me. You have need of me, my lord?”

He sighed. “Come in, my lady. I have received a letter from your father.”

He undoubtedly looked severe, for her face became distressed and she nearly ran to the desk looking fearfully at the parchment. “Is something wrong? Is Father ill? Or Edmure?”

“No, my lady. All is well,” he assured her quickly. “Sit down and read your father’s letter.”

She smiled and took the parchment from his hand as she sat. He watched the blue eyes scan the words and then light up as she exclaimed. “He wants us to come for Edmure’s name day!” Ned said nothing and allowed her to finish the letter. He watched the joyous expression on her face gradually become more thoughtful as she read. She was not a stupid woman, his wife.

When she raised her eyes back to his, she said, “My lord, I am certain that my lord father means no disrespect.” She bit her lip. “It’s only . . .Edmure didn’t want me to leave in the first place. He became rather distraught, and I think my father worries for him. He thinks my presence in Riverrun for awhile might help my brother . . .and make my eventual departure once more easier for him.” She spoke carefully, but Ned knew she had not missed her father’s intent any more than he had. She’d looked at him directly enough as she spoke, but her eyes went back to the letter as soon as she finished.

“Indeed, Lord Hoster worries for his children, my lady, and wishes to preserve them from . . .unhappiness.”

Those blue eyes flashed up to his again quickly at that. “I . . .I am certain you are welcome to attend as well, my lord. My father only points out the many duties you must perform here at Winterfell and has no wish to keep you away from them for as long as he would have me stay . . .” Her voice trailed off at the end. She knew well enough what neither of them would say out loud. Hoster Tully wanted her to come home to Riverrun for an extended period so that she and Robb could bask in the affection of her family with no bastard present to shame her. He also had made it clear that Ned’s presence was not required or indeed even requested.

“What would you like to do about this invitation, my lady?” he asked steadily.

“Do? I . . .What do you mean, my lord?”

“Don’t pretend you do not understand me, Catelyn,” Ned said, irritated with the situation rather than with her. “Do you want to go to Riverrun?”

The expression on her face then was plain enough. Taken aback by the suddenness of his question, she had no time to compose her thoughts and guard her feelings. Her desire to see her home and family was written plainly across her face. Yet, she quickly adopted a more neutral expression. “I will not deny I miss my home, my lord. Winterfell is lovely, and its people have welcomed me, but I do still feel a stranger here in some ways. To see my father or laugh with my little brother or simply to pray in the sept; these things would make my heart glad . . .”

He nearly told her then. He almost gave away the surprise he’d been so carefully planning since that day in the godswood when she’d spoken of his gods, and he’d realized how much she missed hers. The plans were already drawn and the supplies ordered. Construction on the first sept ever built at Winterfell would begin as soon as they arrived. He’d give her gods a home. He’d make this place her home in truth. But no. He could not tell her now. He would not have her feel compelled by gratitude to remain here.

“But . . .I would not wish to take Robb from his home so soon after his arrival here, my lord,” she continued. “He has spent half his little life at Riverrun already, and he is a Stark of Winterfell.”

The earnestness of her words stabbed at his heart. “Indeed he is, my lady,” he said softly. “And a Stark he shall always be. But he is not yet weaned, and his place is with his mother. I would not separate him from you if you wish to travel to Riverrun.”

“But you would miss him, my lord. I know you would. And he, you.”

The very idea of his little boy being gone for more nearly six moons (or more if Hoster Tully had his way) made Ned feel cold all over. The notion that Catelyn believed their son would miss him warmed him a bit.

“I would miss him,” he acknowledged. “Whether he would notice my absence as long as he had you is debatable, but I would certainly miss him.” And you. Sitting here in his solar, looking at her across the desk as her mind warred with itself over what she saw as her duty and her very real desire to see her family and home, he realized he would miss her more than he’d even realized. He did not want her to go at all.

“I think it is too long for us to remain away from y . .from Winterfell, my lord.” Catelyn said, and Ned caught the flush in her cheeks as she nearly said ‘you’ instead of Winterfell. He wondered what it meant.

“I suppose we could ask your father if he’d be satisfied with a shorter visit,” Ned said doubtfully, thinking that once she was at Riverrun, surrounded by all she knew and loved, it would likely take old Hoster very little effort to convince her to stay longer.

She looked thoughtful. “No,” she said. “It is too soon. Robb belongs here. I would not take him traveling until he is old enough to begin to understand that Winterfell is his home.”

“I do not want to keep you here, my lady.”

“You would prefer I go?” she asked him. She looked almost angry, and he wasn’t certain why.

“I will not command you to stay,” he said. 

She looked at him for a long moment, and then she smiled at him. One of those genuine smiles he had come to love so.

“No,” she said. “You would not, and I know it well, my lord. You care for what I want, I know. Sometimes too much, I think.” She bit her lip. “In this, I would have you tell me what you want. Do not command me, my lord. Simply let me know what you wish, and then, with your permission, I shall make my own decision concerning my father’s invitation.”

Her blue eyes did not leave his as she waited for his answer. _How can she even think I would want her to go?_ he thought. “I want you to be happy, Catelyn,” he whispered. “I want that very much.”

“I believe you,” she said, still looking into his eyes. “But only for yourself, what would you have me do?”

He looked at her and said the only honest thing he could. “Stay,” he said. “Please stay.”

Her breath caught in her throat. “All right,” she said. “May I write the response to my father so that he knows it comes truly from me? I will tell him that I am sorry, but Robb and I need . . .want . . .to be in Winterfell now as this is our home. I am certain Edmure will be disappointed, but he will come to understand. And as he is old enough to travel with proper accompaniment, we would welcome him for a visit at Winterfell. Can I tell him that, my lord?”

“Of course,” Ned said. She wanted her father to know that it was entirely her decision to remain at Winterfell, and realizing that left Ned almost unable to speak.

She smiled at him. “When Robb is older, mayhap we can all visit Riverrun. I would not willingly part your son from you, my lord.”

He nodded. “I am glad of it, my lady. I confess I should not enjoy being parted from . . .either of you.”

He saw her breath catch again and a deeper red come to her cheeks. “I am glad to hear it, my l . . .Ned,” she said softly. She did lower her eyes slightly then. “I would be pleased if you would come to my chambers this night.”

He reached across the desk and took her hand, standing up to bend slightly and bring it to his lips. “I will be there, my lady.”

“Cat,” she said. That was the name her family called her. She had told him to call her that when they first wed in Riverrun. She had not repeated the request since her arrival in Winterfell.

“I will be there . . .Cat.”

She smiled again and left him, and he sat back down at his desk, wondering how many hours were left until sundown and wishing devoutly that they would pass very quickly.


	45. To Wed For Duty's Sake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the following tumblr prompt: "Can we pretend I didn't just say that?" And I'm going to challenge you... Robb/Roslin!!!!!
> 
>  
> 
> In which Robb makes a different choice and decides to honor his marriage pact to with Freys, wedding a stranger for the sake of her father's army--just as his own parents had done years before.

Robb Stark looked dejectedly at yet another terrifyingly ugly Frey girl who was presented to him, and he shot his mother a glance. Lady Catelyn shook her head slightly, but gave him a very disapproving look which made him realize his opinion of the unfortunate young lady’s appearance must appear plainly on his face. 

“Forgive me, my lady,” he said to the girl, whose name he’d already forgotten if he’d even heard it. “I fear I have grown overheated. I . . .I need to step outside.” With scarcely a nod toward old Lord Walder, he turned on his heels and all but fled from the hall. He didn’t stop until he stood well outside the walls, taking great gulping breaths under the grey sky.

No one pursued him. He supposed the King in the North was entitled to behave as rudely as he liked. He recalled even his parents, ever sticklers for proper behavior, tolerating all manner of rudeness from Robert Baratheon when that king had visited Winterfell. That didn’t make it right, however, and he was ashamed of himself.

He had to do this. He knew he did. He simply wished he didn’t keep seeing . . .her . . .every time he closed his eyes.

“Robb?” His mother’s voice came from behind him. Of course, she had come after him. “Are you well, Your Grace?”

He turned around to face her. “Don’t call me that, Mother. I don’t deserve it, and you need never call me anything but my name anyway.”

She smiled a little, although Robb thought all her smiles were sad now. She’d been a shadow of herself since his father had been killed although she’d maintained a steely resolve and a strength that rivaled any of his bannermen’s. Since Bran and Rickon, however . . .that strength had seemed to crumble so that at times she seemed to him now only a shadow of a shadow. Yet, still she remained resolved to see him through this whether he asked for her help or not. _She shames me,_ he thought. _I am the king, but I behave as a child. She deserves better from her son._

“I know this is difficult for you, Robb, but remember you asked me to come ahead of you and select the daughter I thought most suitable for you. I told you I have, and I think you will not be displeased. Lord Walder knows full well whom I will recommend to you, and it’s just like the old villain to keep her for last.” She frowned. “And I fear word of your . . .troubles . . . at the Crag have reached his ears. He isn’t pleased at all to hear that you dishonored him in such a way.”

“Dishonored him?” Robb said angrily. “It’s Lady Jeyne, I’ve dishonored, Mother! And that old goat is lucky I’ve chosen to stick to my bargain with him at all! You know I wanted to marry her until . . .”

“Until you heard her speaking to her mother,” his own mother sighed. “Yes, Robb, you’ve told me. I feel more sympathy for the girl than for her mother, surely. But it is plain that she willingly bedded you at her mother’s behest. The fact that she knew nothing of your marriage pact with Lord Frey does not change the fact that she blatantly attempted to force your hand into marriage to herself.” Lady Catelyn’s eyes grew cold. “And she dared use your grief over your brothers to tempt you into compromising yourself. That is unforgivable.”

Robb closed his eyes and saw Jeyne as she had been that night, eyes full of tears for the two boys she had never known, telling him how she wanted only to take away his pain. Then he saw her face as it had looked when he had barged in upon her mother and herself, demanding to know the meaning of what he had just heard. She’d cried to him that she hadn’t known he was betrothed, that she hadn’t known her mother had made a deal with Tywin Lannister, that she truly did love him and wanted to be his wife. His queen. 

He’d been so hurt and so angry, he’d turned and walked out without another word. He’d gathered his men and demanded that they ride back for Riverrun that very night. He’d been greeted there with the news of his mother’s release of Jaime Lannister, and when she’d freely admitted her actions and her motives to him, willing to accept any consequence he saw fit, he had instead confessed his own sin and asked her earnestly if he should return to the Crag and wed Jeyne in spite of what he’d learned. He had deflowered her whatever the circumstances had been.

She’d been appalled at the very thought of that, instead urging him to wed one of Walder’s daughters immediately before word of his actions in the Crag spread too widely. The girl had made her own bed when she agreed to her mother’s plan to seduce him, Lady Catelyn had assured him. Whether her desire to wed him arose from love or ambition or the plots of Tywin Lannister, her actions were dishonorable, and Robb had no obligation to her. He must uphold the bargain he struck with the Freys for they made up nearly half his army now, and he needed every man he had.

Robb had reluctantly agreed, and his mother had ridden almost immediately for the Twins to inform Lord Walder that her son wished to make one of his daughters queen right away that he might secure an heir. Robb had also tasked her with choosing his bride as he honestly thought himself past caring whom he wed at that point. Looking at the Frey maidens he’d been offered thus far today, he realized he cared more than he thought, however childish that made him.

“What if she is with child, Mother?” he asked her, not for the first time. “How can I abandon my own child?”

Lady Catelyn grimaced, and he felt cruel even speaking about such things to her. “You will see that the child is cared for, if there is a child. But Robb, you are not the first man to lie with a woman not his wife. Nor will you be the last. Even the most honorable men have fallen prey to lust.”

He knew well enough of whom she spoke. “Father brought Jon home. He raised him as a son. He never abandoned him.”

“He never cast me aside to wed his paramour, either!” his mother spat at him, and Robb nearly jumped backwards at the force of her words. She closed her mouth tightly and took a long slow breath through her nose. “If there is a child, you may of course take it and raise it however you see fit, although have a care that you do no more insult to your new wife and her family than you must. But, Robb, however badly you feel you’ve behaved toward this Westerling girl, you are bound to a daughter of Walder Frey. You pledged on your honor to make this marriage and you cannot turn aside from that and call yourself honorable in the sight of these men who follow you. Your father would tell you no differently if he were here.”

Robb nodded grimly. “I have no choice, I know. But I cannot pretend to be pleased about it, Mother.”

“You will pretend better than you have done thus far, or you are right in thinking you do not deserve your title, Your Grace. If you think coming to a marriage you did not ask for is somehow more difficult for you than it ever has been for anyone else, then you are mistaken.”

She spoke quietly enough, but with some heat, and it occurred to Robb that she was speaking of herself. “But you loved Father,” he protested.

“I still love your father,” she said, and Robb saw the tears swim in her eyes even as she stood straight and tall and kept her face stern. “I shall love Eddard Stark and mourn him until I die, but I did not love him when we wed. I did not even know him. I did not offer up my maidenhead as an enticement to a man I wished to have for myself as your Jeyne Westerling did. I did my duty and wed a stranger to secure an alliance. Roslin Frey will do the same when she weds you, and I dearly hope you treat her with as much kindness as your father showed me when I was brought to him naked and afraid.”

His mother had never spoken to him like this before, and the image she painted of her own wedding and bedding chilled him for it seemed so at odds with everything he knew of his parents’ marriage. She obviously saw it on his face for her own face softened slightly. “I know that is difficult for you to believe, Robb,” she said softly. “But it is the truth. You already know the truth of what your father and I made of our marriage. You know how happy we were with each other and all of you children.” His mother’s voice quivered then, and he knew she thought not only of his father, but of his dead brothers and lost and captive sisters. “This is a difficult start to a marriage, Robb. I will not deny that. But you can make something more of it. I promise you that.”

She reached out and took his hands, and he nodded. He could do little else but agree as he stood there looking at her, and he walked with shoulders back and as much confidence on his face as he could muster as he went back into the hall with his mother on his arm.

“Lord Walder,” he said in a voice that sounded surprisingly strong and clear to his own ears. “I hope you and your lovely daughters can forgive my terrible discourtesy. I fear the long ride here exhausted me to the point that I felt faint in the heat of the hall. My mother has admonished me for not eating this morning, and I have assured her that I am quite well enough to return to this most pleasant task of becoming acquainted with your daughters.” 

Old Walder laughed, an unpleasant sound if ever there was one, and said, “Well, a king is a king, even if he’s weak as a girl or an old man. Heh. And a girl that beds him _after_ saying the words and putting that direwolf cloak on her shoulders is a queen even if he isn’t so much of a man as he might be. Heh. Heh. So shall we get on with it, Your Grace?”

His mother’s fingers dug painfully into his arm, reminding him that king or not, he needed this vicious old windbag with all his sons and grandsons and men at arms very badly at the moment. He bit back the angry retort that came to his lips and nodded graciously. “I would be most pleased by that, my lord.”

He was introduced to three more girls, none of whom he could imagine bedding at all. He knew his mother would tell him there were far more important things than a woman’s appearance, and he imagined his father would say the same. But, in fairness, he thought his father would hardly have the right to comment on such matters, for whether Father had wanted to wed her or not, no one had ever disputed that Catelyn Tully Stark was a beautiful woman. And however determined he was to resign himself to this, Robb thought it certain he would find it far easier to bed a beautiful stranger than an ugly one.

When the next girl was brought before him, he wasn’t even looking at her at first. He was staring at the Tully sigil displayed above that of the Twins on the wall behind Lord Walder, thinking that his mother’s House Words were harder to live by than he’d ever suspected when he heard Lord Walder call this one Lady Roslin. _Roslin? Wasn’t that the name Mother had said?_ He glanced quickly toward his mother and saw that her face bore the tiniest of smiles as she nodded to him. He took a deep breath and turned to look at the girl who would be his bride for he had no doubt he would trust his mother’s judgment in this. He had no reason to do otherwise, after all.

When he truly saw the girl before him, his eyes widened in surprise. This girl was small with delicate features. Her skin was pale, as pale as Mother’s or Sansa’s, but her hair was a rich brown color and it fell to her waist. She was lovely. Truly lovely.

“Your Grace?” she said softly, looking up at him, and he realized he was staring at her.

“My lady,” he said, finding his voice again. “You are not ugly at all.” Her eyes widened then, and it dawned on him precisely what he had said. “Oh gods!” he exclaimed. “Can we pretend I didn’t just say that?”

She smiled shyly and even laughed a little. “I am afraid I heard you quite clearly, Your Grace, but I shall pretend I didn’t if you wish me to.”

He smiled back at her, knowing his cheeks were red. “I do wish it. You see, Lady Roslin, my lady mother has spoken very highly of you, and because of her words and my confidence in her judgment, I had already made up my mind to ask for your hand.” He twisted his mouth and looked at her apologetically. “I would not wish you to believe your future husband is a discourteous lout.”

She smiled more broadly and curtsied deeply. “You do me a great honor, Your Grace,” she said formally. “I will never believe you discourteous.”

“I am glad of it,” Robb told her.

“Oh, we’re all glad of it. Heh.” Old Walder put in. “So this is the one you want, eh, Your Grace? You’ve settled on it? Then let’s have some food and some music. We’ll drink to the King in the North and to my daughter who’s to be his queen. Heh. Heh. And tomorrow, we’ll see you wedded and bedded.”

Robb noted that Lady Roslin’s cheeks flushed when her father mentioned the bedding, and he thought it charming. When he looked up at his mother, he saw her smiling at him with a rather satisfied look on her face. _She could have told me the girl she’d chosen for me was beautiful,_ he thought. But he realized that the smile on his mother’s face would be the closest she ever came to acknowledging that Roslin’s beauty had played a role in her choosing the girl as the best queen for her son out of all of old Walder’s daughters.

Roslin sat between Lord Walder and himself as they ate, and his mother sat on his other side. Roslin spoke very little unless she was addressed, but she answered his questions readily and pleasantly enough and smiled very prettily. His mother whispered to him at one point that she had found her to be an intelligent girl, but somewhat intimidated by her father, and Robb wondered if she might not be more lively once she was away from him.

When the music started, he asked her to dance immediately, and after looking to her father for permission, she followed him out onto the floor. Even this small increase in the distance between herself and Lord Walder seemed to put the girl more at ease, and Robb thought his mother was likely correct in her assessment.

“This time tomorrow evening, we shall be dancing as man and wife, my lady,” he said. “Do you find that as strange to believe as I do?”

“I find it a bit disconcerting to imagine my being married at all, Your Grace,” Roslin admitted. “Much less my being married to a king.”

His mother had told him she was a few years older than he, and Robb very much wanted not to be viewed as a boy by his bride so her referring to him as a king made him smile. Still, when he thought about his parents, he realized that he wanted even more for her to be able to think of him as her husband. His mother had ever recognized his father as the Lord of Winterfell with all that entailed, and not once had he ever seen her be less than respectful to him even when she had been angry. Yet, he had heard his mother call his father ’Ned’ as often as ’my lord,’ and he rather suspected she had been even less formal with him when no one else was present.

“My name is Robb,” he said to the pretty girl in his arms. “I would have you use it, if you would. I must be ’Your Grace’ to nearly everyone, but I am Robb to my family, and you will be my family, Lady Roslin. It would please me to have you call me by my name.”

“Yes, Your Grace,” she said, and then she giggled. “Robb . . .I mean.” Her pale cheeks colored a bit when she said his name, and once again he was charmed by it.

They spoke more as they danced than they had at the table beside Lord Walder, and Robb found that his mother had been right. While she certainly was more shy than either of his sisters, Roslin had a lively intelligence, and he suspected her quickness to laugh hinted at a sense of humor.

That suspicion was confirmed for him when she bid him goodnight just before she retired from the hall. He apologized once more for the thoughtless remark he had made upon first meeting her and she had laughed. “I have forgotten any remark that might indicate my king is even capable of discourtesy,” she said with a sparkle in her eye. Before Robb could respond to that, she leaned in and said in a voice so quiet that he had to strain to hear it, “But I shall not forget that my husband Robb does not find me ugly at all!” With a giggle, she curtsied to him a final time and left the hall accompanied by two of her sisters, leaving Robb smiling after her.

He looked for his mother and then remembered that she had gone up to bed earlier, pleading exhaustion. Mother was tired, he knew, but he also knew that she had little use for song, dance, and revelry since the Lannisters had taken his father’s head. That thought made him frown as he recalled how much he still had to accomplish. He had to go home and take back Winterfell and the North from the murderous reavers and that fiend Theon Greyjoy. Theon would pay for what he had done. He would pay for Bran and Rickon. Then he still had to defeat the Lannisters. He would have justice for his father if it took him an entire lifetime to obtain. As he considered the overwhelming tasks ahead of him, Robb feared it just might take a lifetime. 

But when he recalled the way his bride-to-be had smiled at him when she made her parting remark, he thought that perhaps in this one thing, he had actually found good fortune. As Robb Stark, King in the North and the Trident went to his room to spend his last night as an unwed man, he found himself unexpectedly looking toward his wedding the following day with something quite a bit removed from dread.


	46. Little Lady

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the following prompt on tumblr: For the pairing meme: I know pairing usually means romantic pairing but would you maybe be willing to do one about Ned and Sansa for "can I tell you a secret?"
> 
> This is a little tale from Sansa's POV. When her feelings are hurt by a playmate, and she doesn't understand why, a conversation with her father helps clear things up, but makes her realize that growing up is not as completely wonderful as she'd thought.

Sansa Stark watched her brothers practicing in the yard, or at least that’s what she said she was doing when anyone asked. It was proper for young ladies to watch their brothers practice at arms. It was not proper for them stare at rude boys who wouldn’t even talk, and wonder what was wrong with them.

Markus sat on the rock wall across the practice yard from where she stood. He and three other boys were watching Robb and Jon as well, shouting encouragement and occasionally hooting at them when one of them made a misstep. Jeyne had said that lowborn boys shouldn’t shout at their betters like that, but when Sansa had asked Mother about it, she’d smiled and said that the boys in the castle meant no harm, and that she thought Robb rather enjoyed the audience.

It was a fortnight past her tenth name day, and she wore one of her new dresses. The weather was warm enough that she didn’t need a cloak, and she liked showing off the pretty colors. Most of her dresses were in blues or greys, but this one was a deep green and she liked it because it was different. It was probably a bit too fancy to wear out in the yard for no reason, but she didn’t care. There were no feasts or tournaments or anything happening at Winterfell any time soon, and she couldn’t just leave the pretty thing hanging in her room forever.

“If you get that dirty, Mother will kill you.”

She hadn’t seen her little sister sneak up beside her. Arya was always sneaking up where she wasn’t wanted.

“I don’t get my dresses dirty,” she said haughtily. “That’s you.”

Arya shrugged. “I don’t wear dancing dresses out in the mud at least.”

“You’d wear breeches if Mother would let you!”

“She does,” Arya said with a smug grin. “Any time I go riding. And if I forget to change back when I finish riding?” She shrugged again.

Sansa huffed. Arya was impossible. She was wearing a dress now, a grey one, but the bottom was stained with mud and gods knew what else. It was an old one, at least. It used to be hers, Sansa recalled, although it had looked much nicer then. Arya couldn’t take care of nice things.

“Hey! Markus! Joren! Ben! Which one of my brothers is getting knocked down the most?” Arya called out, running across the yard to where the boys sat on the wall. Robb and Jon interrupted their practice session to laugh at her, and Ser Rodrik shook his head, but he looked amused rather than angry. When Arya reached the three boys on the wall, she tried to jump up, but at only eight years old, she was still a bit too short, and Sansa watched Markus and Joren reach their hands down to pull her up to them, laughing all the while.

Sansa’s face felt hot, and she turned around angrily. Arya played with all the boys in the castle, normally preferring their company to that of the girls. But Markus was her friend, not Arya’s! What was wrong with him? And he was already one and ten! Why would he laugh and jape with stupid little eight year old Arya and not even look at her now?

She walked away from the yard back in the direction of the Great Keep scarcely even looking where she was going. When she reached the Keep, she jerked open the door and ran directly into her father.

“Sansa!” he exclaimed. “Where are you going in such a hurry, my little lady?”

He had always called her that. “Nowhere,” she mumbled, not looking up at him. She felt tears stinging her eyes, and she didn’t want him to see her cry.

“Sansa?” he asked, puzzled. “Look at me, child.”

Sansa sighed. It wasn’t quite his lord’s voice. It was gentler than that, but his voice still made it clear he would be obeyed, and she slowly looked up to face her father.

He took one look at her and his puzzlement immediately became concern. “Are you hurt, sweetling?”

She shook her head, fearful of opening her mouth lest she start crying in earnest.

He regarded her for only a moment before saying, “Come with me,” in that same voice that was not unkind, but brooked no argument. Then he extended his arm to her just as he always did to Mother, and that almost made her smile in spite of how miserable she felt.

She realized he was leading her to his solar and that he undoubtedly would keep her there until she gave him some reason for her distress. She wished he had simply taken her to Mother.

He brought her to a seat right next to his behind his desk. She knew it was the seat Mother always sat in when her parents worked together here. Sansa had seen both of them bent over some parchment on Father’s desk, heads close together, any number of times. Somehow, it made her feel a little better simply to be sitting in Mother’s chair wearing her pretty green dress. Someday, she would be a fine lady like Mother, and she wouldn’t care that Markus wanted to play with Arya.

“Now, Sansa,” her father said very seriously, looking directly at her. “I may not be as good at this sort of thing as your mother is, but I can tell you are upset. Has someone done something to cause you distress?”

She shook her head.

“Have you been arguing with your sister?” Father asked, sounding resigned.

She frowned, but then she shook her head again. “No,” she said. “It’s not really Arya’s fault. It’s just …why would he want to play with her when she’s only a little kid, and he’s my friend! He’s always been my friend!”

Father looked rather lost. “Who, Sansa? You’ll have to tell me plainly, my little lady.”

“Markus,” she said, looking down.

“Markus,” he repeated, the name sounding almost like a question. “Oh! The cook’s oldest boy!” He smiled at her. “The one who steals you lemoncakes.”

She looked up at her father then, eyes wide in shock, and he laughed at her.

“Oh, I know all about that, little lady. He’s been doing it since you were only four or five.”

Sansa felt her lip begin to tremble. “He doesn’t anymore,” she said, and the tears started to fall from her eyes. “He didn’t even bring me one on my nameday!”

“Sansa! I watched you eat more lemoncakes than I thought could possibly fit inside your little body on your nameday!” her father exclaimed. “Surely, you didn’t miss one more.”

“But he always gives me lemoncake on my nameday,” she said. “And …and a flower. He picks one out of the godswood. But this year …this year he didn’t even talk to me. And now he plays with Arya! And she’s only eight, and I know I don’t like to climb on things and get dirty, but Markus …Markus …”

“Ah,” her father said softly. “I think I may see what’s bothering you, sweetling. Markus has been your playmate for a long time, hasn’t he? I don’t recall your playing with any of the other boys in the castle. Only him.”

“He was always nice to me,” she said with a shrug. “He didn’t mind that I don’t like to play in the dirt or throw things or hit people with sticks. He did all that stuff with his other friends. But he would climb up and get apples for me, and he liked me to tell him stories about knights and princesses, and he let me teach him to play Come Into My Castle.” She twisted up her mouth a minute. “He even told me he thought girls were supposed to look pretty and wear nice dresses. So why does he want to play with Arya? She never looks pretty, and she ruins her dresses!”

Her father’s mouth twitched and his grey eyes lightened momentarily, and she thought was going to laugh, but he didn’t. “Sansa,” he said seriously. “Markus is older than you, is he not?”

She nodded. “He’s one and ten. His name day was a moon before mine. I gave him a little wooden knight. I always give him one. They’re all different, too, but this time …he barely thanked me. He barely even looked at me.”

Father sighed. “Ah, my little lady.” He did laugh then, but it sounded almost sad. “I call you that, but the truth is you are not so little anymore. You and Markus have been friends a long time, but now he is becoming a young man, and you are his lord’s daughter.”

“So is Arya!” Sansa protested. “And he still talks to her!”

“Well …yes,” Father said. “But as you correctly pointed out, she is still a little girl, while you are becoming a young lady.” He pressed his lips together. “It is likely, Sansa, that his parents have cautioned him about remaining too close with you. While there is nothing wrong in your friendship, sweetling, you will one day wed a lord and be the lady of your own castle. Likely we’ve no more than two or three years before offers of betrothals start arriving for you.”

She looked at him. She knew this already. She often daydreamed about being the lady of her own castle. She imagined herself directing the staff and presiding over wonderful feasts on the arm of a handsome lord, looking as beautiful as her lady mother. She didn’t understand what that had to do with Markus.

“Markus will be a tradesman, Sansa. He is a good lad, and I have no doubt he will be a good man, and he’ll have wife and family and do his best to provide for them.”

“But what does that …”

“How do the men in the castle treat your lady mother, Sansa?”

“They all treat her with every courtesy,” Sansa said quickly. “No one would dare treat Mother unkindly or disrespectfully.” She knew her father wouldn’t allow it, and anyway, everyone in the castle truly liked Mother.

“And do they bring her lemoncakes? Or spend time with her outside the performance of their duties? Do they tell her how pretty her dresses are or her hair?”

“They …oh.” Her face fell a little. “That wouldn’t be proper,” she said softly. “You mean it isn’t proper for Markus and me to be friends?”

“There is no fault in your friendship, Sansa,” Father assured her, “as long as you are both children, and it is merely friendship. But you are both growing up, and I am afraid, my little lady, that you are growing to be quite beautiful.” He smiled at her. “The boys of the castle look at you entirely differently than they do your sister, and when you’re a bit older you shall see what I mean. Young Markus is not blind, you know. And you look quite lovely in that dress.”

Sansa felt her cheeks grow hot. “Markus always told me I was pretty. I mean …before he stopped talking to me.” She swallowed hard. “But …why wouldn’t he just tell me if he’s not allowed to play with me anymore. I don’t like it, but I wouldn’t be angry with him then. I mean, if it’s because we’re too old or his mother is afraid he’ll like me too much, that’s not his fault. Why does he want to make me mad?”

“Ah. Speaking clearly to a beautiful girl,” her father said, shaking his head. “Sounds simple, doesn’t it?” He smiled at her, and beckoned her to come and sit on his lap. “Can I tell you a secret?” he said very softly.

She nodded.

“When a boy gets to be about Markus’s age, and certainly when he gets much older at all, speaking to beautiful girls can become nearly impossible.”

“That’s silly!”

“No! It’s true. When a beautiful girl smiles at a boy, it makes his insides feel funny and his tongue feel far too big in his mouth to move and form any words at all.”

“That sounds terrible.”

“It is,” Father said with a smile. “And it isn’t. In any event, I’ve no doubt that Markus has begun to show some of that sort of interest in you if Bett has warned him away. She’s a sensible woman and wouldn’t stop her son from playing with any of my children for no reason.”

“Maybe,” Sansa said thoughtfully. “Before he stopped talking to me, he started showing off a lot. It was annoying really, but then Jeyne said that she heard the kitchen maids talking about the weaver’s daughter, the one with yellow hair, not the plump one, and the way that Theon was acting a fool around her, and how he had it bad, and I asked Robb what ‘had it bad’ meant and he said it was when a boy liked a girl not like just friends, but oh, you know, and I asked Mother then if a boy acting stupid and showing off meant he liked a girl, only I didn’t say I meant Markus, and she said yes sometimes it did.”

Her father stared at her for what seemed like a very long time with a dazed expression on his face when she’d finished that statement. “I’m not entirely certain I followed all of that,” he said finally. “But yes. If somewhere in that sentence there was a notion that boys show off to impress girls, then the answer is definitely yes.” He smiled again. “Unless, of course, their beautiful smiles turn a boy’s insides to liquid. Then he can’t do much but be quiet.”

“Did that ever happen to you, Father?” she asked, grinning up at him.

“Oh, yes,” he assured her. “Once, a pretty girl’s smiles had me so turned inside out, I couldn’t speak to anyone at all. My brother Brandon made fun of me and asked the lady to dance with me just to see if I would be able to stand up and do it.”

“Were you? Able to dance with her?”

“Just barely,” he laughed.

Sansa smiled. She liked having her father talk with her like this. She rarely got him all to herself. She rarely got either parent all to herself as Father was so busy, and Mother nearly always had baby Rickon with her when she wasn’t busy somewhere in the castle. “Thank you for talking with me, Father,” she said courteously.

He smiled at her. “You have the best manners of any lady I have ever seen, sweetling. You would outshine any maiden in King Robert’s court.”

“Do you think so?” she asked eagerly. “Do you truly think so?”

“I do,” he said solemnly. “I enjoyed speaking with you, as well. I have a confession to make, though. Had your mother not just been dragged away to deal with some crisis between your two younger brothers, I would likely have taken you to her. I fear these things are more in her area of expertise. I hope I have made you feel a bit better, at least.”

“You did. Did Mother ever smile and make your insides feel funny, Father?”

He laughed. “She still does.” He gave her a conspiratorial look. “But you won’t tell her that, will you?”

“I can keep a secret,” Sansa promised with a smile. She hopped off her father’s lap and walked toward the solar door. “I will miss playing with Markus, though,” she said a little bit sadly. “Can’t you talk to his mother?”

Her father shook his head sadly. “His mother has the right of it, I’m afraid, Sansa. You and Markus are growing up, and it’s time for each of you to begin moving into your rightful places.”

Sansa felt an odd heaviness in her heart at that. Ordinarily, she was excited about the prospect of growing up. All she’d ever wanted to be was a beautiful lady just like her lady mother. Now, she began to think it might be more complicated than she thought, and not always quite as wonderful as she’d dreamed. “Growing up is hard, isn’t it Father?” she asked as she stood in the doorway.

He smiled at her once more, but his eyes still looked a little sad. “Aye, my little lady. It is. Try not to do it too quickly, all right?”

“I’ll try. I promise.” She turned and left the solar then and decided to go in search of her lady mother. Hopefully, she’d sorted whatever mischief Bran had gotten into with the baby, and Sansa could show her how pretty she looked in the new green dress.


	47. Bidding My Sisters Farewell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for the tumblr prompt: Tully siblings + it's never too late
> 
> Robert's Rebellion is finally over, and the new king is secure on his throne. For Edmure Tully that means only that he has to say goodbye to both of his sisters.

His sisters were leaving today. One to the south, and one to the north, and he didn’t know when he would see them again. Ten year old Edmure Tully sat alone under a tree on the bank of the Red Fork and wondered what tomorrow would be like. He couldn’t imagine Riverrun without Cat and Lysa. He’d even grown used to the presence of Cat’s baby. Little Robb had Tully hair, and Cat swore he looked just like Edmure had as a babe. Edmure liked when she said that.

He didn’t like the way Lysa looked at Robb. He knew his second sister had been angry for a long time, but she hated baby Robb. He’d said as much to Cat once, but she’d told him he was wrong. She’d told him Lysa only wished to have a babe of her own and it made her sad to look at Robb, but Cat was wrong. Edmure could see it on Lysa’s face.

Lysa loved Cat, of course. Everybody loved Cat. And Lysa had clung to her and cried nearly all of last night. He shouldn’t have spied. He was supposed to have been in bed long before his sisters went to their rooms, but he’d been hungry and sneaked out of his room to find something to eat and saw Lysa run to the room Cat shared with baby Robb. She hadn’t closed the door all the way so he’d been able to listen.

“I can’t stand it, Cat! I can’t!” Lysa had sobbed, and Edmure had chanced a peek through the narrow opening and seen his sisters on Cat’s bed. Cat had been sitting up holding onto Lysa almost the way she did baby Robb, with Lysa’s head on her shoulder.

“Hush now,” Cat had soothed her. “You can, Lysa, and you must. We shall both go and be good wives to our lord husbands.”

“But he’s terrible!” Lysa had moaned.

“Lord Arryn is a fine man,” Cat had insisted. “An honorable man. A high lord and the Hand of the King. Think of it, Lysa! You’ll be one of the most important ladies at court!”

“He’s old!” Lysa had wailed. “He’s old and his skin feels like leather, and when he climbs on top of me, it’s just …it’s just …” She started crying harder.

Edmure was old enough to understand what his sister was talking about, but he hadn’t wanted to think about men doing that to either of his sisters.

“Lysa,” Cat had said almost sharply. “I know you weren’t happy with this marriage. Do you think I asked to be wed to Lord Eddard? My lord husband will be no less a stranger to me than yours. Yet, we shall both do our duties, and I promise, Lysa, when you have children you will …”

“What if I never have children?” Lysa had said desperately. “Your husband isn’t an old man, Cat! He already gave you, Robb! Of course, he’ll give you more. Young men can father children readily enough. What if Lord Arryn is too old? What if all that grunting and pushing and sweating comes to nothing?”

“You have no reason to think that way, Lysa,” Cat’s voice had returned to its soothing tone. “Men older than Lord Arryn have fathered children. Look at Walder Frey, for gods’ sake!”

“What …what if I can’t …” Lysa’s voice had gone very soft.

“Don’t be silly. Of course, you can …”

“You don’t know. You don’t know,” Lysa had whispered, and her voice had sounded hollow to Edmure. It had scared him.

“You are seven and ten, Lysa. We are both still young. We shall both have many children and long lives ahead of us.”

“What if it’s too late, Cat?” Lysa had sounded frightened.

“It’s not too late. It’s never too late,” Cat had assured her.

This morning when they’d broken their fast, Lysa wasn’t crying. She was glaring at baby Robb and even at Cat. Lysa loved Cat, but sometimes Edmure thought she hated her a little, too, and he didn’t understand why. She’d glared at Father this morning as well, but she’d hated him ever since Petyr left. Why anyone would take stupid old Petyr’s side over Father’s, Edmure couldn’t say, but Lysa had.

He’d tried to tell Cat once that Lysa hated Father just like he’d tried to tell her about Lysa hating Robb, but Cat had told him to hush. Of course, Lysa didn’t hate their father, she’d said, and he should never say anything like that again. She was just upset about Petyr leaving Riverrun because he had been her friend. Edmure had obeyed Cat and never said it again. (He generally obeyed Cat—at least more than he did anybody else, anyway.) But, he still knew she was wrong. He’d wondered why grown-ups (because both of his sisters were grown-up now whether he wanted them to be or not) couldn’t ever call hate what it was. Kind of like grown-ups didn’t call people stupid or ugly even if they were stupid or ugly. Courteous grown-ups didn’t anyway, and Cat was always courteous.

Lysa didn’t hate him, though. She was mean to him sometimes, but she would still play with him on rare occasions when Cat never could anymore because she was always busy with baby Robb. When she was in a good mood, Lysa would even tell him stories or listen to him tell her about something he’d done. He would miss Lysa. He loved her.

Leaning back against the tree trunk, he closed his eyes. He would miss Lysa, but he couldn’t even bear to think about Cat leaving. She’d been as much a mother as a sister to him. That’s what the servants at Riverrun said anyway. He didn’t really remember his mother, so he wasn’t entirely sure what one was supposed to be like. He only knew that Cat took care of him. She always had. Well, at least until baby Robb came. Now, she didn’t do so much with him anymore, but he supposed he understood, even if he didn’t like it. And he was practically a man grown. He didn’t need a sister or a mother now. A tiny voice inside him insisted that he did need Cat, even if he didn’t need her to tuck him in at night or sing him to sleep, or make sure he got enough good food on his plate at meals, or tell him when the river was too wild to swim. He didn’t want her to go.

As he sat there, he heard a soft sound almost like a sob. He listened carefully, and realized it actually was a sob. He got up and walked a little ways up the river through the trees and there he found his sister, sitting on the ground and crying softly to herself. Not Lysa. That wouldn’t have surprised him. Lysa always cried. Cat never cried. Cat was brave.

“Cat?”

She startled and turned around to look at him. “Edmure! I didn’t know anyone was there.” She hastily wiped her eyes with her hands.

“Why are you crying, Cat?”

“I’m not …” She laughed then. “I suppose it’s rather ridiculous to tell you I’m not crying while I’m still wiping my eyes.” She beckoned him to her. “I’m all right, though, little brother. Just being silly.” She ran her hand fondly through his hair when he sat down beside her.

“No. You’re being sad,” he said, wondering again why grown-ups couldn’t call anything what it was. “Why are you sad, Cat?”

“I’m not actually sad, Edmure. I will miss you and Lysa and Father, though.” She smiled at him. “So I guess I am a little bit sad. And I’ll miss Riverrun.” She pulled him against her, and kept tousling his hair. “It’s cold in the North. And there’s no river at Winterfell.”

“Where will you swim?” Cat liked swimming, he knew.

She laughed at him, though. “It’s too cold to swim in the North,” she said. “Brandon once told me of hot springs there. Pools in the ground with water warmer than a heated bath. He said I could swim in those if I liked.”

“Did you believe him?”

She laughed again. “I wasn’t sure. You could never be sure what was truth and what was jape with Brandon. But Lord Eddard told me the same. And I don’t think he is the sort of man who would lie.” She bit her lip then and looked anxious, almost scared.

“What’s wrong, Cat?”

“What? Nothing’s wrong, Ed. I’m just saying goodbye to the river and it made me sentimental.”

“Does sentimental mean scared?”

“No, silly. It means …Edmure,” she said, really looking at him then. “Why did you think it means scared?”

He looked back at her. “Because I think you are scared.”

She shook her head. “There is no reason for me to be scared. I worry about some things, but those aren’t for you to worry about. I will be fine, and you are just …”

“Don’t say I’m just a little boy,” he insisted, thinking angrily that he sounded very young when he said it. “I am the heir to Riverrun and nearly a man grown.” He looked at her. “And I say you’re scared.”

Her face seemed to quiver, and her eyes seemed to water again, and he threw his arms around her. “I’m sorry, Cat! I didn’t mean to upset you. I just …you always make me feel better when I’m scared, and if you’re scared, it’s all right. You can tell me.”

She had been holding him as tightly as he held her, but now she pried his arms from around her and held him back a bit, lifting his face to look up at hers. “My little Ed,” she said softly. “You truly aren’t so little any more, are you?” She sighed and looked off in the direction of the river. “I am scared, Ed,” she said softly. “I don’t know if I can live where it’s cold all the time, and yet I shall have to. I told Lysa to be brave and be grateful for her lord husband even though I can’t imagine …with such an old man …” Her cheeks flushed, and she looked quickly at Edmure as if she’d only just recalled to whom she was speaking. “Ed …I didn’t …”

“I know what husbands and wives do, Cat,” he said, trying very hard not to make a face at the thought. “But your husband isn’t old.”

“No,” she said softly, looking down at her lap. “I shouldn’t be afraid, I know. Lord Eddard is scarcely older than I am, and he was very kind when …” Her cheeks flushed again. “I know he is a good man. An honorable man,” she said firmly. She looked at the river again. “But I don’t really know him,” she finished softly.

“I’d be scared, too, Cat,” Edmure said after a minute. “If I had to go live in a cold place I’d never seen with somebody I didn’t really know. I’m glad I never have to leave Riverrun.”

“No,” she said. “You’ll bring a wife here someday, and if she comes from far away, I know you’ll treat her kindly and make her welcome.”

Edmure made a face. “I don’t want a wife,” he said.

“Well, I should hope not at ten years of age!” she laughed. “But you will one day.”

Edmure shook his head. “Uncle Brynden doesn’t. And I don’t either.”

“We’ll see. Come along, little lord. Robb is likely wakeful and hungry and my maid is certainly cursing my absence if he is.”

“When do you go?” Edmure asked.

“Soon,” she said softly. “Too soon,” she whispered, almost to herself.

“You will be fine, Cat. You’ll be the best Lady that Winterfell ever saw.” He wanted to beg her to forget about stupid Winterfell and just stay here if she was scared to go. But he knew she would never do that. So, he tried to be brave enough to help her be brave. It’s what she’d always done for him, after all.

She smiled at him, rising to her feet, and reaching a hand back down to pull him up as well. “I shall certainly try. I intend to give Robb a happy home, Edmure. I want that more than anything.” She bit her lip again. “And I think Lord Eddard will want the same. I hope he doesn’t mind that Robb looks so much more like me than him, though.”

Edmure snorted. “Of course, he won’t mind! You and Robb are way better looking than he is!”

“Edmure!”

“It’s true!” he said, laughing and dodging the hand she swiped at him. He started to run back toward the castle then, knowing she’d follow.

The next hours seemed to go far too quickly for Edmure. He barely had a chance to see either of his sisters in the midst of all the activity, and then they were saying their final farewells, and he found he could barely speak at all to either of them around the giant lump in his throat. He watched them ride away, down the River Road—one sister filled with grief and anger and fear, the other filled with courage and hope but also with more grief and fear than she’d admitted to anyone but him.

When they were long out of sight, he began to think of all sorts of things he’d wanted to say to both of them. He had a crazy desire to grab a horse from the stables and gallop after them. He needed to tell Cat to stay warm and Lysa to look for all the famous knights. He forgot to tell them both they had to come back and visit soon. He realized miserably he hadn’t even told them he loved them.

And now it was too late. As he stared out the window of his bedchamber in the direction his sisters had disappeared, he held on to the words he’d heard Cat tell Lysa last night. It’s never too late. He hoped she was right. He wanted all of them to live a very long time so that he could see them again and again and tell them all the things he’d forgotten to say today.

“It’s never too late,” he whispered to himself just before he finally fell asleep. 


	48. Asking More Than I Should

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for an anonymous tumblr prompt: Ned/Cat- You want me to do /what/? :)
> 
> This is a modern AU with a story that I don't even KNOW where it came from! Suffice it to say that Robert Baratheon and his family have behaved horribly enough that the Starks have completely cut them out of their lives, but now Robert needs one more favor from Ned, and Catelyn is having none of it. Seriously, I have no idea how I even made this one up. :)

“You want me to do WHAT?”

Ned Stark thought he was prepared to handle the inevitable explosion he’d known this request would detonate, but as he looked at his wife now, blue eyes blazing with a mixture of disbelief and fury, he feared that had been a foolish notion.

“It’s only for the weekend, Cat.”

“I don’t care if it’s only for an hour!” The fury was rapidly outpacing the disbelief as she hissed those words through her teeth. “I will not have them in my house and that is final.”

She turned away from him and began moving things around on her dresser in an obvious pretense at being too busy to discuss it further. When he stepped forward and laid a hand on her arm, she jerked away from him.

“Now, Catelyn,” he said in what he thought was a reasonable voice.

She whirled to face him. “Don’t you dare ‘Now, Catelyn’ me, Eddard Stark. I can’t believe you have the nerve to even ask this of me. After what happened last year!”

He sighed. She had every right to be furious. Dammit, he was still furious over what had happened, but he couldn’t simply leave the man and his family out on the street. He’d been closer than a brother to him once.

“I haven’t forgotten anything that happened, my love. I assure you of that.”

“You have a strange way of reassuring me, Ned,” she said, shaking her head at him, “asking me to ever let those people back in our home.”

“Only for the …”

“No.”

“They have nowhere to …”

“No.”

“I told him …”

“No.”

She turned away from him again, and this time walked out of their bedroom and down the stairs. Left without options, he followed her. She’d been outside weeding the flowerbeds when he’d asked her to come in to talk, and she had her long, auburn hair pulled back in a ponytail which now swished from side to side rather violently as she practically fled from him down the stairs.

“Stop following me, Ned,” she snapped when he followed her into the kitchen.

“We have to talk about this, Cat.”

“No.”

He sighed. “Is that one word truly all you can say?”

She’d kept her back to him, but she whirled around again then. “Oh, I could say a lot of words to you right now, Eddard Stark, but you do NOT want to hear them.”

She’d used his full name twice in less than five minutes. She was furious.

“I do,” he insisted. “I want to hear every word you have to say. Even if you want to call me a goddamn son of a bitch or a motherfucking bastard.”

Her eyes went wide. “I have never used such foul language to you in my life!” she exclaimed.

“I know,” he said, with the hint of a teasing grin. “That’s why I decided to head you off. I’ve rarely seen you so pissed off at me, Cat, and I didn’t want you to break your streak.”

She looked at him a moment, and then she closed her eyes and he saw her lips twitch before a whispered “Damn you” escaped those lips on a breathy laugh. She opened her eyes and shook her head at him. “How do you always manage to do that?”

He grinned more widely at her. “Years of practice, my love. Years of practice.”

She sighed and walked over to sit down in one of the kitchen chairs. “Talk,” she said. “But I warn you, I still have no intention of letting them stay here for five minutes, let alone three days.”

“Cat,” he sighed. “He was my best friend once.”

“Was,” she said emphatically. “Now he’s nothing more than an obnoxious drunk and his wife is a bitch from hell. Don’t even get me started on that demonspawn of a son of theirs!”

His mouth twitched in amusement in spite of himself. “What? You have nothing to say about the other two children?”

“They should be removed from the custody of those two awful people before they start acting like their older brother,” she said without hesitation.

He laughed. “God, I love you,” he said.

“And I love you. And the answer is still no.”

Ned sighed again. “Cat, if they don’t get out of the house by 3pm on Friday, the police will be there to forcibly evict them.”

“Couldn’t happen to a better bunch.”

“I know you aren’t that heartless.”

“I am when it comes to them.”

“You would see Cella and Tom put through that sort of spectacle?”

She pressed her lips together. “That isn’t fair,” she said. “They have family, Ned! Why is this our problem? I wasn’t aware you’d even spoken to the man since his son and wife managed to get us splashed all over the tabloids last year.”

“I haven’t,” he said. “I knew it had to be bad for Robert to even call me. He wouldn’t have if he’d had anywhere else to turn. He’s ashamed of what happened, Cat.”

“He should be,” Catelyn said coldly. “In case you’ve forgotten, in this fit of brotherly charity you seem to be feeling, that man had your wife backed up against a wall with one hand under my blouse and the other up my skirt.”

“I haven’t forgotten,” he said, and he closed his eyes against the memory of a very drunken, but still very large and strong Robert Baratheon pinning Catelyn against the wall of their bedroom after following her in there during their annual New Year’s Eve party last year. His wife had been desperately trying to get him to come to his senses and get off her without screaming or causing a scene, and thank God Ned had come upstairs to retrieve a coat for a guest who was leaving early.

He’d pulled Robert off her, bloodied his nose, and the larger man had promptly passed out cold on the bedroom carpet. As Cersei was also far too drunk to drive, he’d then called a cab to come pick up all the Lannisters immediately and watched his wife somehow muster the resolve to repair her hair and makeup and soldier on through the rest of the party as if nothing happened before breaking down in his arms and crying hysterically when the last guests finally departed at 2:30 in the morning.

They’d thought that was the end of it until the first pictures showed up. It turned out that twelve year old Joffrey had been upstairs at the time and without being seen by anyone, managed to take pictures of the assault. As the boy apparently hated his father, he’d taken great joy in selling them to a tabloid. Cersei Baratheon in some attempt at damage control, and thinking simple adultery was more palatable in the business world than attempted rape then went on several talk shows discussing the torrid affair her husband had been having with his friend Eddard Stark’s wife, and how the pictures of their rendezvous had prompted him to take stock of his life and recommit to his marriage and their corporation.

For nearly a month, this strategy seemed to be working as Robert said nothing to contradict his wife’s story and was seen all over town with Cersei on his arm in a show of solidarity. Ned and Cat had been forced to go public with the truth of the matter, but still Catelyn had been unable to escape ugly accusations and innuendos everywhere she went, and Stark Industries stock had taken a hit.. Then Sansa, who’d suffered nightmares that caused her to wake screaming ever since that party, finally told Cat and him what Joffrey had done to her puppy that night. He’d tied the poor thing’s paws together and then put a length of twine around its neck, tightening it every time Sansa refused to give him a kiss. She was only ten years old. Fortunately, he’d been distracted from that game when he’d realized what was going on in the master bedroom and neither Sansa nor Lady had taken any lasting physical harm, but almost a year later, Sansa remained a far more withdrawn little girl than she’d ever been.

He’d confronted Robert with what his son had done and that finally seemed to break him in some way. He begged Ned not to press charges against Joffrey, confessed his own actions regarding Catelyn that night, and pled guilty to a misdemeanor assault charge and was sentenced to a $1000 fine, six months probation, and mandatory alcohol abuse treatment.

Robert had actually put effort into beating his alcoholism and had, to everyone’s surprise, remained sober since. The bad publicity, however, had nearly sunk Baratheon Capital. Cersei had demanded that Robert hand the reins of the company over to her in the wake of the scandal, and her bad business decisions had finally put the ailing corporation completely underwater. From what Robert had told Ned on the phone, he and his wife had borrowed from everyone on the planet in a desperate attempt to keep afloat, and when the inevitable crash came, it left both the Baratheon business and the Baratheon family owing millions.

_I have nothing, Ned. Nothing in this world. Cersei and I may deserve to reap what we’ve sowed. God knows I don’t give a damn about her or me. But I wouldn’t have my children publicly humiliated if I can help it. So I’m asking what I’ve got no right to ask. Please Ned._

_Please Ned._ He hated those words. Lyanna had spoken them when she’d begged him to get her and her infant son out of the country so that neither the babe’s married father or Robert, who at the time was her very jealous and still possessive ex-fiance, could find them. Not everything Ned had needed to do in order to completely disappear Lya and little Jon had been strictly legal, and he and Catelyn had fought bitterly over his putting himself and her and then infant Robb at risk. Now, he was asking her to lend a hand to a man who may have actually raped her had he not been there to stop it—not to mention the woman who cruelly slandered her and a boy who’d essentially tortured their daughter.

“At least I don’t need to break the law this time,” he muttered under his breath.

“What? Ned, I asked you about their family. Robert’s brothers. Cersei’s father. Surely, Tywin Lannister hasn’t allowed himself to be dragged into this pit. Hasn’t he got the money to bail them out?”

She still sat as rigidly as if she were made of iron. Ned shook his head.

“Tywin has washed his hands of them, it seems. Something has happened over at Casterly Rock. No one’s seems to know much about it, but it seems old Tywin hired a detective of some sort to spy on his own children. God only knows what he found, but all three of them were dismissed from any positions they held there. As far as Cersei’s concerned, he’s also one of the lenders who called in his debts from Baratheon Capital, so anything of Tywin’s company that might have been hers is now his alone. She’s cut off completely.”

“My god. How does a man do that to his own children?” Catelyn said quietly, and Ned had to keep himself from smiling at the way his wife’s unflinching sense of justice did not apply to parents and children, apparently. He knew well enough that their own children could never do anything that would cause her to abandon them, and it never failed to surprise her when other parents seemed to feel differently about theirs.

“As for Stannis,” Ned continued, “he hasn’t even spoken to Robert in five years—not since Robert forcibly bought him out of their father’s business. Of course, the man’s likely glad of that now. And Renly is willing to take them in, it seems. Unfortunately, when Renly up and moved to Europe with his Tyrell lover …what’s his name?”

“Loras,” Cat said softly. “I don’t know why you can never remember that.”

“Loras,” Ned nodded. “They pretty much cut all ties here, financial and otherwise. They’ve got some house in Switzerland, I think, that they’re willing to let Robert and his family stay in for awhile, and Renly’s even buying them plane tickets.”

“He can’t even pay his own airfare?” Catelyn asked incredulously.

“I told you, Cat. They’ve got nothing. Anyway, Robert was surprised, but grateful that Renly was actually willing to lend a hand. He says it’s the first time in his life that he’s actually been rewarded for his attitude that anybody ought to be able to fuck anybody they choose whenever they take a notion.”

Cat stiffened, and Ned cursed himself for quoting Robert quite so accurately. “But,” he hurried on. “He can’t leave the country until he is actually off probation and that won’t occur until Monday.”

“Why not send Cersei and the children? They aren’t on probation, although Joffrey should be locked up somewhere. Robert can sleep in a shelter somewhere for the weekend.” Her blue eyes were ice. People told him he had the coldest glare they had ever seen, but he believed his wife could rival it when she chose.

He swallowed. He’d asked Robert that. He’d even offered to pay to change their tickets. He didn’t want to see his former friend any more than Cat did. He didn’t think he’d be able to look at the man without seeing him pawing at Catelyn and wanting to kill him all over again. “If he lets her out of the country with his children without him there, he’s afraid she’ll take them and disappear,” he said softly.

“Oh.” She said nothing else. She didn’t need to. She understood it all now without his saying another word. For fourteen years now, Robert Baratheon had believed Lyanna Stark and her infant son were dead—the infant son that he believed wrongly to be his own child. His grief had been as powerful as the jealousies which had caused Lyanna to flee from him in the first place, and his drinking had escalated to impossibly large amounts. Nothing had given him comfort—not his marriage to Cersei, their children, his business successes—nothing. He’d systematically destroyed himself over time, and Ned had watched it—keeping his silence to protect his sister and nephew as Lyanna had asked and blaming himself all the while.

Catelyn told him repeatedly that none of it was his fault. While she’d opposed his part in Lyanna’s flight, that had been based on the risk to him. She was thoroughly convinced that Lyanna, Robert, and Rhaegar Targaryen had all made their own beds and that each was responsible for their own actions.

“It won’t bring him peace, you know,” she said quietly after a moment. “Living in Europe off the charity of a brother he barely knows with a woman he hates.”

Ned nodded. “I know.”

“Will it bring you peace, Ned?” She looked at him directly. “Can you let it be finished between you? Whatever it is you think you owe Robert Baratheon, will this clear the debt?” She spoke quietly still, but he still heard the venom in her voice when she spoke Robert’s name.

“I don’t know, Cat.” He shook his head slowly. “I don’t owe the man anything. I do know that, my love. And what he did to you …what they did to us …” He clenched his fists. “But I can’t … I can’t just leave him to drown.”

She stood then and walked over to him, bending to plant a soft kiss on his forehead. “No,” she said softly. “I suppose you wouldn’t be the man I love if you could.”

He pulled her into his lap and put his face in her hair, reaching up to pull the little elastic band down over the ponytail so that the auburn mass fell loose down her back. She laughed just a little as he ran his fingers through it.

“Can’t you just pay for a hotel room for them?” she asked.

“The press will be all over them the minute the eviction news breaks, and a hotel is damn near impossible to keep quiet. If we get them here before everything hits the media, they can avoid the press. God knows, this is the last place anyone would think to look for them.”

“I’ll not have our children here,” she said. “I want none of them near Joffrey Baratheon, especially Sansa.”

“Your father’s been begging to have them for a weekend of fishing and swimming. I doubt they’ll be hard to convince.”

“No,” she said thoughtfully. “Although Rickon’s a bit of a handful for Dad. I suppose we could ask Nan to go along.” The woman who’d served as nanny to Ned and his own siblings and now to his children was getting advanced in years, but still seemed more than capable of corralling young Starks. Rickon, in particular seemed to mind no one better than Nan other than his mother.

“Or you could go,” he suggested tentatively. “I wouldn’t ask you to play hostess to them, Cat. Not after …”

“No,” she said quickly. “I won’t leave you to deal with them alone,” she said firmly. She bent her head to kiss his lips and then looked at him. “I’m not the only one Robert Baratheon hurt that night,” she said. “Do you think I don’t realize that?”

He put his arms more tightly around her. “I think I owe you more than I can ever repay,” he said softly.

She sighed, “And I wish you would spend less of your time feeling guilty and indebted to people, including me.” She ran her fingers through his hair and down over his face. “But since I know that’s not going to happen, I can at least offer you reasonable repayment terms.” Her fingers moved down along his chest and abdomen toward his crotch.

His eyes opened widely. “Cat, I …”

She sighed. “They can stay here, Ned. For three nights only. We’ll send the children away, put some sort of bell on Joffrey so he can’t sneak up on people, keep Cersei so full of wine, she won’t leave the sofa, and I’ll carry a cattle prod and stick Robert with it any time he gets within three feet of me.”

He laughed in spite of himself.

“Then we shall call them a cab and send them on their way. You are not driving them to the airport. They’re on their own, come Monday.”

He nodded agreement.

“It will be miserable, but we’ll survive it, my love. We’ve survived worse.”

“I’ve brought you more misery than you deserve, Cat.”

“Ah, you’re back on about your indebtedness again,” she said. “And I promised you good terms. School isn’t out for another two hours, you know, and Nan has Rickon at the zoo so I could get the gardening done. As you’ve already left the office to come and give me this cheery news, I don’t think you should go back.”

“You don’t?”

“I don’t. I think you should begin your debt repayment program.” She leaned and whispered something into his ear.

“You want me to do what?” he said, looking at her with feigned shock. “I’m a respectable married man!”

She licked her lips and smiled at him. “It’s your debt,” she said, pushing his hands off her so she could rise. “Pay it if you like.” She stretched like a cat then and his eyes moved over the lines of her body. “I’ll be upstairs if you accept the terms,” she said, turning to go.

He sat where he was, watching the way her hips moved as she walked and feeling his own body respond to the sight of her as well as to her suggestion.

“And for the record,” she said, turning to face him as she reached the kitchen door, “I want very much for you to do that. Please Ned.”

She turned and walked back toward the staircase and he smiled after her, knowing that as much as she would enjoy what she had in mind, this was truly about him. She wanted to give him peace and comfort and love, regardless of how many times he asked more of her than he had a right to. He thanked God for her as he had countless times before and would do countless times in the future and rose to follow his wife upstairs, thinking that from her lips, at least, ‘Please Ned’ was the most beautiful two word phrase in the English language.


	49. Sharing Secrets With My Sister

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for this tumblr prompt: Could you maybe do a non-romantic one for Edmure/Cat? Edmure and Cat- "Can I tell you a secret?" Their relationship is just adorable, I can never get enough of it xD
> 
> This is a tale from the POV of 6 year old Edmure Tully, who doesn't understand everything that's going on with his oldest sister, but understands that he wants her to be happy and to be in Riverrun with him as long as possible.

Six year old Edmure Tully liked to sneak out and go down to the river bank. He would throw rocks into the water or make boats out of reeds and see if they could stay afloat as the current carried them away. He never swam when he sneaked out, though. He wasn’t a stupid boy and knew it wasn’t safe to swim without Cat there to show him where the water was shallow and still enough and then to swim out and grab him back when he did inevitably go too far out and get caught in the current. Edmure knew what had happened to the blacksmith’s little boy when he went swimming alone after all the rain three moons ago, and he would never let that happen to him.

It wasn’t fair that he wasn’t allowed out here by himself even though he was smart enough to be safe. Cat was allowed to come to the river when she wanted. Not that she ever did when stupid Brandon Stark was here. Even Lysa and Petyr could come and go pretty much as they pleased. But not him. _I’m not a baby,_ he thought angrily. _Even if they think I am._

He never used to sneak out because Cat was always willing to take him to the river. She’s the one who’d taught him how to make the reed boats and could make them better than he could. But she never took him anywhere when stupid Brandon Stark was here. And since Brandon’s last two visits had lasted FOREVER, Edmure had taken to sneaking out and discovered that he rather liked the feeling of doing something forbidden, even if he had been caught twice and whipped for it. Mostly he didn’t get caught, though.

He hadn’t been caught today, and he’d even found a tiny frog with very pretty spots which he’d managed to smuggle back into the castle for Cat. She’d been quiet and seemed sad that morning which surprised him because stupid Brandon was here, and she was usually all smiles and laughter when he was around. He thought the frog might cheer her up. He just had to make up a story about finding it someplace inside the castle walls.

“Will Lord Hoster send Mella away, do you think?”

He heard one of the maid’s voices coming from inside his sisters’ bedchamber and wondered why his father would ever send Mella away. She worked in the kitchen and had pretty yellow hair and smiled a lot and everybody liked her. He’d heard one of the older stable boys say she was a good ride once, but he’d never seen anywhere near a horse, much less riding one, so he didn’t know what the boy meant. Anyway, Mella was always nice to him.

“If her belly swells, I reckon he will,” said another voice. _Another maid,_ thought Edmure. _If they’re cleaning Cat’s room, she won’t be there._

He started to go back down the corridor to search for her elsewhere when he heard the first girl say, “Do you reckon Lady Catelyn knows about it?”

He stopped then. He knew it wasn’t right to listen to other people’s conversations, but he wanted to hear what it was that his sister might know about.

“I don’t know, but everybody else in the castle does. Ser Robin found them going at it in the stables, and I heard neither had a stitch of clothing on!”

Both girls giggled, and Edmure wondered why anyone would take their clothes off in the stables. There wasn’t anywhere in there to bathe.

“My poor lady looked so pretty last night, too. I got to help serve at the dinner, and afterward there was dancing. She danced every dance with that rogue, and she looked very happy about it. They took a walk in the godswood after that.”

“Maybe he rode her as well,” the second girl whispered.

“Bite your tongue, Leda! She’s a proper lady and you know it!” The first maid sighed. “But the gods know he is a handsome devil.”

Edmure didn’t understand this conversation, but he thought some of it at least was about his sister and Brandon Stark. All of the girls in the castle thought stupid Brandon was handsome. He moved closer, thinking that maybe if he could see the maids as they talked, their words might make more sense.

That was a mistake for it turned out that one of them was looking right at the open doorway and saw him there immediately.

“Lord Edmure!” she cried in some alarm. “How long have you been there?”

Maids didn’t normally question him in that tone of voice, and he frowned. “I’m looking for my sister,” he said, trying to sound as much like his lord father as he could. “Do either of you know where she is?”

The two maids looked at each other. “Which sister?” the one called Leda said carefully.

“Cat. Lady Catelyn,” he corrected himself quickly.

“She’s in the godswood. I heard her tell Lady Lysa she was going there,” Leda replied, looking at him suspiciously. Edmure wondered if she knew he’d been listening to them speak or if the frog was moving about enough to be noticed beneath his shirt. He hoped she wouldn’t tell his father about either thing if she did know.

“Thank you,” he said as courteously as he knew how, and then he nearly ran from the room to find Cat.

He didn’t slow down until he got to the godswood. He wanted to find Cat, but he hoped she wasn’t with stupid Brandon Stark. He’d caught them kissing here once and Cat had turned very red and made him promise not to tell Father while Brandon had just laughed.

She was alone today, though. He saw her sitting on the lawn by some blue flowers, looking in the other direction.

“Cat!” he called out, running toward her.

She turned to face him, and he stopped suddenly. Her eyes were all red and puffy.

“What do you need, Edmure?” she said and her voice sounded funny.

“Are you crying, Cat? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said rather sharply. “What do you need?”

Cat rarely snapped at him, and it startled him. “Nothing,” he stammered. She continued looking at him expectantly through watery eyes, and he stuck his hand inside his shirt to grab hold of the little frog that had finally fallen asleep against his warm skin. He held it out toward her. “I caught you a frog.”

She blinked, and then she made a sound that was almost like a laugh. “A frog,” she repeated.

“He’s got pretty spots. I thought you’d like him,” Edmure said, walking over to sit down beside her.

“Ah,” she said. “He is a pretty little fellow, Ed. And I do like his spots.” She reached out a single finger to stroke the back of the tiny amphibian in Edmure’s hand. He’d known she’d like it. Lysa wouldn’t even touch frogs, but Cat always said they were funny and cute.

“You’ve been down at the river again, haven’t you?” she asked him, raising her eyes from the frog to look him in the face.

Edmure squirmed. He’d forgotten to think up a good story when he’d stopped to listen to the maids talking.

“Don’t bother answering,” she said with a sigh. “If you don’t actually confess, I won’t have to lie should Father ask me anything later. He was looking for you an hour ago.”

Edmure remained silent and studied the frog intently. “Wanna hold him?” he asked her finally.

She smiled and held out her hands, and Edmure dropped the frog into them.

“Does he make you happy?” he asked her.

“Yes,” she said, laughing and quickly covering the animal with one of her hands when it tried to hop away. “He tickles,” she said, looking at Edmure again. “You make me happy, Ed. Thank you for the frog, but I suppose you and I will have to go down to the riverbank and let him loose now.”

“You don’t want him?” Edmure said, crestfallen.

“Of course I do! But he can’t live in the castle, Ed. He needs the river mud to be happy, and I want my frog to be happy. If I name him before we let him go, he’ll always be my frog even if I don’t keep him beside me.”

“Really?”

“Really. Mother let me help pick out your name, you know.”

“I know.” He’d heard that story before.

“And you will always be my brother and always make me happy even when you’re not with me.” Her eyes started to look watery again.

“I’ll always stay with you if you want, Cat,” he said hurriedly.

She sighed. “It isn’t about what I want, is it?” Before he could puzzle out what she meant by that, she got to her feet, still holding the frog carefully in one hand and using the other to push herself up. “But we’re together now, and I’d like to go to the river with you.”

“But …what about Brandon?” he asked, frowning. Cat never went anywhere with him when Brandon was visiting.

“He left this morning, not long after breakfast,” she said in a tight voice.

“I thought he was staying until …”

“He left,” she said sharply.

Edmure stood up, too, and Cat held the little frog out. “Here. I’m afraid Tickle will have to go back under your shirt. I don’t want to explain how he came to be here, do you?”

Edmure grinned and took the frog. “Tickle?” he said. “That’s his name?”

She nodded. “For the way he feels in my hand.”

When he had the frog securely tucked away again, she reached out to hold his hand, and he let her. She never made him hold her hand like a baby, and he thought maybe she needed a hand to hold right now. She still didn’t seem as happy as he wanted her to be. Maybe she was sad because stupid Brandon left before he was supposed to.

“Hey,” he said, wanting to cheer her up more. “I bet Brandon comes back really soon since he had to leave early.”

She bit her lip and looked past him at the flowers. “Oh, he’ll return soon enough. We are to be married, after all.” She sounded almost sad when she said that, and that surprised him.

“Cat?” he asked, looking up at his sister’s pretty face. He’d always thought his sister was very pretty. Well, both of his sisters were pretty, really, but Cat was the prettiest. She was prettier than any girl in Riverrun. Even Mella with the yellow hair. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Of course.”

“I don’t want you to marry Brandon Stark.”

“Oh, Edmure.” Her face seemed to crumble and she hugged him against her waist. He was worried she might smush Tickle. “I don’t really want to marry him right now, either.”

That stunned him. She talked about stupid Brandon all the time. She sewed scary looking direwolves on everything. She talked about Winterfell and the North as if she’d been there rather than just read everything she could find about it. “You don’t?” he asked her.

“Not today,” she sighed, letting go of him to wipe her eyes. “But I suppose I’ll get over it. I shall have to get over it, won’t I?”

“No! If you don’t want to get married and go away, just tell Father and …”

“Edmure,” she said firmly. “It is a good match. I shall be the wife of a high lord from an ancient and noble house. I will not find better.”

“But …”

“But nothing,” she said. “Brandon Stark will be my lord husband and I will be a good wife to him and mother to his children. We will have a fine life in Winterfell.” Edmure thought she sounded like she was trying to convince herself as much as him.

“Are you mad at him for something?” He thought back to the conversation he’d heard from the maids. He wished he could remember their exact words better. He wanted to ask Cat about it. To ask her if whatever they’d been talking about is what made her sad, but he didn’t want to admit he’d been eavesdropping.

“Yes,” she said softly. “But it isn’t anything for you to worry about. And as I said, I shall get over it.”

“He shouldn’t make you sad or mad. And when he does come back, I’ll tell him that!” Edmure said vehemently.

“No you won’t,” she said. “You will speak not a word of this to anyone, Edmure Tully. Do you understand me? If you do, I won’t ever tell you any secrets.”

“Is this a secret? That you’re mad?”

“Yes. Will you keep it for me?”

Edmure nodded solemnly. Cat was good at keeping his secrets. He would keep hers. Although he didn’t think that being mad at stupid Brandon Stark was as good a secret as sneaking out to the river. He was mad at stupid Brandon Stark pretty much all the time.

“Then I’ll tell you another one,” she said, taking his hand again and leading him from the godswood. “Brandon told me he thinks it’s high time we were married—that I’m five and ten now and we shouldn’t have to wait any longer.”

“He’s in a big hurry to get married? That’s the secret?”

“Well, he’s in a big hurry for some things,” she said bitterly. “And he’s proven well enough that he won’t wait for that.” Before Edmure could ask what she meant, she smiled down at him with an almost wicked look in her eyes. “But that’s not the secret.”

“What is?” he asked eagerly.

“When we were dancing last night, I promised Brandon that I’d speak to Father. That I’d tell him I want to be married very soon and that nothing would make me happier than becoming Lady Stark before my next nameday. Father has always said we must wait until I am least sixteen, but he would relent if I begged him.”

Edmure nodded. Father rarely denied Cat anything. Of course, Cat rarely asked for anything, either. She always just did what was expected of her.

“But I’m not going to do that now,” she said fiercely. “I’m going to tell him I don’t feel ready to be married. That I don’t want to leave Riverrun while you’re still so young and Lysa isn’t even betrothed. That I’m not ready to give up the rivers and flowers for cold and snow.” She gave him that wicked smile again. “I’m going to tell him that I’m not even certain I’ll be ready at sixteen. Maybe we should put the wedding off until I’m seventeen or even eighteen.”

“Really, Cat?” Edmure liked any secret that might keep his sister in Riverrun longer.

“Really. I will be Brandon Stark’s lady wife one day, but it won’t be this year. And not the next either, if I can help it.”

He grinned at her. “I won’t tell anyone, Cat. Especially not stupid Brandon.”

“Edmure,” she said severely, “You are not to call my betrothed stupid. You will give him all the respect he is due.”

Edmure frowned until he noticed that her blue eyes still sparkled mischievously in spite of her stern words. “Of course, my lady,” he said solemnly, bowing at the waist.

Tickle nearly fell out of his shirt when he did that, and Catelyn actually laughed out loud. “Come on, Edmure,” she said. “Let’s take my frog to the river bank before he gets loose in the castle and gives Lysa a fright!”

Edmure walked hand in hand with Cat all the way out of the castle, waving to the men at the gate who never even questioned him because he was with her. His heart felt light at the thought that she wanted to stay here with him more than she wanted to go north with Brandon Stark and even lighter at the fact that he’d put the smile back on her face. He still didn’t know exactly why she’d been sad or mad in the first place, but he knew he’d been the one to make her happy. And that pleased Edmure Tully very much.


	50. A Visit to King's Landing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> written for this tumblr prompt: Catelyn/Ned + Robert - "Can I tell you a secret?"
> 
> When Ned comes to King's Landing for the celebration of Robert's tenth year on the throne, Robert seems dismayed that he brings Catelyn along as well. But Ned is very, very happy that his wife is there with him.

“Ned! They told me you’d practically sneaked into the Red Keep, man! Why didn’t you send someone to find me the moment you arrived?”

Robert enveloped him in a most un-regal bear hug, and Ned Stark couldn’t help smiling in spite of his weariness from the long journey. “Gods, you’re a sight for sore eyes, Ned!” Robert exclaimed when he let go of him enough to stand back and look at him.

“It is good to see you as well, Your Grace,” Ned replied, realizing as he spoke that he had missed his friend more than he’d realized over the past nearly four years. The time they’d spent together during the Greyjoy Rebellion had gone a long way toward healing the rift between them after Robert had taken the throne, and while they would never again be as close as they were as boys in the Eyrie, he knew the man he now called king would always be a brother in his heart.

“Fuck that, Ned,” Robert said bluntly. “I get called ‘Your Grace’ all day every day. Why in seven hells should I bother having you here if even you can’t seem to remember my name?”

Ned laughed at that. “I remember your name, Robert,” he assured him. “I also remember that you are my king, and I would have you know that.”

“I know that well, Ned,” Robert said, his tone turning serious. “I wouldn’t have this throne if not for you, and I’d give it back if it would return your sister to us, but there’s no man’s loyalty I value more than yours. I would have you know that.”

Robert’s mention of Lyanna caused Ned to swallow hard. The man had never wavered in his devotion to her memory, and on the one hand Ned loved him all the more for it, but any thought of Lyanna and the events that had put them all where they were now took his mind to places he’d rather it not go. He was grateful, therefore, when Robert clapped his shoulder hard and returned to his previous jovial manner.

“My gods, man! You look exactly as you did when you sailed away from Pyke in such a hurry to get back to Winterfell in time to see your wife drop that new pup! And you’ve got another one from her since, right? A boy?” Robert shook his head. “I never knew you had it in you! Do you ever let her out of her bed?” He laughed uproariously at his own joke, and Ned hoped rather desperately that his friend’s voice didn’t carry as well as he feared it did.

“We have a second son as well as a second daughter now, yes,” he said quickly. “Our Bran is of an age with your youngest, I believe. He had his second name day just prior to our departure, and Arya is nearly four now. You are looking fit as well, Your Grace.”

In truth, he thought his friend looked considerably less fit than he had when they’d fought side by side on Pyke, but he wasn’t going to say that. To be fair, he knew his own beard was beginning to have quite a bit of grey in it, and Robert hadn’t mentioned that either. Robert’s hair was still as black as ever, and even if he had grown just a bit thicker and softer round the middle, he was still a powerfully built man.

“I told you no more of that Grace shit, didn’t I?” Robert turned to look around the room. “How do you like the accommodations? This is one of the largest and nicest guest chambers we have. I told them only the best for you. There are two more rooms through there, and the views are nice.” He grinned wickedly. “I intend to show you quite a few lovely views while you are here, my friend. You can’t claim to be quite so frozen now that you’ve made a habit of putting little Starks in your pretty red-headed trout with such alarming frequency, and there’s no reason not to keep yourself good and warm and entertained here in King’s Landing. My gods, Ned, the women here know secrets you’ve likely never dreamed of, and I intend to see that you …”

“Your Grace. Forgive me for not greeting you sooner, but I was changing out of my traveling clothes.”

Robert’s reaction to hearing Catelyn’s voice and then to seeing her there before him, bent into a graceful curtsy in the doorway from one of the side rooms would have been comical had Ned not been mortified at the realization that his wife had plainly heard all that the king had just said. She had her head bowed which hid most of her blush, but Ned knew his wife well enough to be aware that she was struggling mightily to control the flaming of her cheeks before she had to raise her eyes to Robert Baratheon. He walked quickly to her and took her hand.

“Cat! … Lady Stark! …I did not realize you were here,” Robert sputtered, coming to stand before her, and offering his own hand to her as an indication for her to rise.

“I thought as much, Your Grace,” she said pointedly yet courteously as she stood up straight and looked the king directly in the eyes. Ned had to suppress a smile as Robert now looked far more embarrassed than Catelyn.

“The invitation to this celebration of your tenth year on the Iron Throne was made to the Lord and Lady of Winterfell, was it not?” Ned asked him.

“Well …of course, it was! But …all those children! You haven’t left Winterfell at all, my lady, and I simply thought …” Robert said, trying valiantly to regain his composure.

“Well, that isn’t entirely true, Your Grace,” Catelyn said. “I’ve ridden with Ned to visit some of the Northern castles closest to Winterfell. And we did travel once to Riverrun to see my father and brother after Arya’s birth.” She smiled. “But you are correct in that I’m rather loath to leave my children for any length of time. I’ve never left them this long before, and I confess I miss them terribly already.”

“I asked her to come, Robert,” Ned said quietly. “Bran is weaned. All our children and our lands are thriving, and my lady wife deserved a visit to court. And you deserve both of us here to pay fealty on the tenth anniversary of your coronation.

“Yes…well …it is very good to see you, my lady. You are as beautiful as ever, and Ned is undoubtedly one of the luckiest men I know in regard to his marriage.”

“Thank you, Your Grace,” Catelyn said with perfect courtesy.

“Oh!” Robert exclaimed. “There won’t be any rooms prepared for you. I am certain the servants can find something suitable, even with all these bloody guests arriving—-I’ll have my steward see to …”

“Catelyn can stay here, Robert,” Ned interrupted calmly.

“What’s that?” Robert said, turning from Catelyn to Ned as if he hadn’t quite understood what he’d said.

“I said that your steward need not trouble himself about finding more rooms. As you’ve already said, these chambers are quite large—certainly spacious enough for the two of us.”

“There’s only the one actual bedchamber, though,” Robert said doubtfully, and Ned carefully avoided looking at his wife as he heard a small cough escape her which he knew well enough was covering a laugh.

“That isn’t a problem, Your Grace,” he assured his friend, using the title intentionally. “We will both be quite comfortable here, but as you may have noticed, I am still wearing my clothes from the road and would very much like to change before tonight’s dinner, if you would permit me.”

“Oh! Of course, yes!” Robert still appeared a little off balance, but he grabbed Ned’s hand and then actually pulled Catelyn in for a brief, but still rather intimate embrace. Had it been any man other than the king, Ned would have objected, and even with Robert, had the man not released her when he had, he might not have allowed it to pass. “It is a wonderful thing to have you both here,” Robert said with enthusiasm, “And I shall see both of you in the Great Hall for dinner.”

When he’d left, Ned turned to face his wife, “I am sorry, Cat …” he started to say at the same time she said, “Will you share with me these secrets of King’s Landing the king wishes to show you?”

“Gods, Cat,” he said putting his face in his hands and shaking his head. “Robert is …”

“The King of the Seven Kingdoms,” she said firmly, coming to lay her hands on his arms. “And a man who I am most glad is not my husband.”

Ned looked up to see those blue eyes regarding him with a mixture of amusement and sympathy, but she did not appear angry. “He should not speak so,” he said. “It is disrespectful of you, and I should not allow it.”

Catelyn sighed. “Kings say what they like, my love. And what offense did he give me, truly? He may have spoken crudely, but all he truly said of me is that my husband appears to enjoy my bed.” She smiled at him. “I flatter myself that that statement is true enough.”

He put his arms around her. “Would that I had time to show you how true! Now that we have an actual bed once again at our disposal, I find myself rather eager to have you in it, my love.”

She pressed her lips to his briefly and then pulled herself away. “We haven’t the time now, I am afraid. “You must wash and dress before dinner, and I have to decide what I am doing with my hair.”

“I can think of things I would like to do with your hair,” he said, reaching for it.

She laughed and moved out of his reach. “Well, my lord, when tonight’s dinner is over, you can show me what you have in mind, unless of course you are too engrossed in discovering what secrets good King Robert and the ladies of King’s Landing have to share with you.”

“That isn’t funny, Cat,” Ned said sharply. “I have no interest in Robert’s whores or in any other woman.” Her words had been light, but nevertheless he felt the shadow of Jon Snow fall between them. She loved him, he knew, and she had come to trust him as well, but he never forgot that he’d brought a bastard into their home, and she never forgot it either. He often worried that promises of fidelity on his part would forever ring false to her, and that caused him to stumble over such promises. “I have all that I desire right here before me,” he said finally. “And Robert dishonors himself, his queen, and both of us when he makes such lewd suggestions.”

She bit her lip. “I told you, my love. Kings say what they like. But his words needn’t trouble you for they do not trouble me. I know well enough the man my own lord husband is.”

She turned from him then and went back into the room where she’d begun unpacking their things. Thanking his own gods and hers for this woman who was by some odd quirk of fate his wife, he followed her through the doorway.

Much later, Ned found himself sitting on the right side of the king as they dined, a high honor indeed, especially given all the nobility present. While he appreciated the honor and did enjoy Robert’s company at least initially, he disliked the fact that it separated him from his wife who was seated at the table just below with a number of lords and ladies. She appeared to do well enough for her part. Ned could see her smiling at her dinner companions and occasionally heard the musical sound of her laughter drifting up to where he sat. Frequently, her eyes found him there as well, and she would smile at him. The men at her table seemed quite taken with her, and he didn’t particularly enjoy that either. Even Robert commented at one point about Cat’s effect on the men around her, and Ned honestly couldn’t say whether he or Robert’s queen became more irritated by that remark.

Robert’s golden Lannister queen was certainly a beauty. Like Catelyn, she had regained a remarkably lovely figure after having a child two years before, and her smiles tended to have men falling over themselves. Unlike Catelyn, she seemed to accept this attention as her due, and she actively sought it from every man in the Hall with the exception of her husband. Toward Robert, the woman behaved coldly, bordering on rudely. To be fair, however, Robert seemed intent on ignoring her, and his attentions toward the pretty girl who kept refilling his wine glass were lecherous to an embarrassing degree. As he finished glass after glass of the wine, he became louder and even more inappropriate in his remarks, and Ned found himself devoutly wishing the meal would end.

When dancing was finally announced at the conclusion of the final course, Ned nearly catapulted himself from his seat to claim his wife’s hand before anyone else could do so. That had her laughing nearly too hard to take his arm and come out onto the floor with him for she knew how little he cared for dancing.

“You’ve missed me, my lord?” she teased him.

“I cannot express how much,” he assured her.

“I’ve been no more than ten feet from you.”

“Too far,” he said, pulling her against him a little more tightly than was strictly proper for the dance. “Much too far.”

She laughed again and tolerated his mediocre attempts to spin her through the movements of the dance, correcting him with a subtle push or pull whenever he made a misstep. After three dances, he was forced to let her go, however, as to continue to fend off everyone wishing to dance with her any longer would have been rather discourteous. He started back toward his seat, and was grateful to see that Queen Cersei was dancing with her twin brother. Had she been without a partner, he’d have felt compelled to ask her to dance, but in truth he had no desire to do so. He intended to simply sit down and watch his wife dance for a few songs until he could reclaim her.

“Ned!”

Robert’s voice called to him before he reached his table, and he turned to see his friend motioning to him from an alcove partially hidden by a large, heavy tapestry depicting a hunting scene. Sighing, Ned walked over to him, only to be pulled behind the tapestry by his friend.

Robert’s face was ruddy and his eyes were slightly unfocused. His doublet was undone, and the serving girl from earlier along with another girl were seated on a small settee behind him, both of them with their breasts completely exposed.

“Robert, I …”

“You remember Ina from dinner, right, Ned?” Robert hissed in what he undoubtedly thought was a whisper, but was horribly loud to Ned’s ears. “This is her sister, and the two of them will do anything, won’t you girls?”

Both girls giggled, and Robert reached over to grope them both as he spoke.

“Your Grace, I don’t think you should …” Ned started.

“Quit thinking, Ned. That’s your problem. You think too much. Look at them. They’re perfect. And they’ll do whatever I ask …to me, to you, to each other …” He grinned. “King’s Landing can be a wonderful place.”

“Robert, I’ll not be a party to …”

Robert sighed and let go of the two girls. “Go on, girls,” he said. “You know where. I’ll be along.”

Still giggling, Ina and her sister disappeared through a door in the rear of the alcove that Ned hadn’t realized was there.

“Don’t look at me like that, Ned,” Robert frowned when they’d gone. “I’ve gotten three children on that frozen cunt Jon tied me to. I’ve done my duty for the realm. Gods know I’ve had no pleasure from it!”

“Robert …”

“Don’t Robert me, either. Your sister should have been my queen, you know. Gods, with Lyanna by my side and in my bed, I likely wouldn’t need such …distractions. But I do need them now, Ned. I’m a man, after all. Hell, any man likes a bit of variety. And don’t tell me I’m wrong about that. Even you have a bastard at Winterfell to prove your cock’s got an appetite for more than just your redhead.”

“I dishonored my wife. I take no pride in that, Robert,” Ned said coldly.

“For gods’ sake, Ned! You fucked a girl! I hope you enjoyed it! I hope you enjoy fucking your wife, too, although the gods know I wouldn’t know anything about that. You can treat your wife well and still have your own fun, you know. You’re not in that frozen backwater you call home now. You’re in King’s Landing, man! Live a little!”

Robert had begun slurring his words and actually swayed a little where he stood. As angry as Ned was, he found himself feeling almost sorry for the man. “Robert, I want no part of this,” he said sadly. “I only want …”

“Here you are, Your Grace, my lord. I wondered where you‘d gone!”

Ned nearly jumped out of skin at the sound of his wife’s voice and silently thanked the gods that the half naked girls were no longer present. He turned to see Catelyn smiling brightly at both of them although her eyes hardened a bit when she looked at Robert.

“Cat,” Robert said. “Ned and I were just …we were just …”

“Telling secrets, Your Grace?” she said with a little laugh. “Boys do have their secrets, don’t they?”

Robert grinned widely. “That’s what I was just telling your husband,” he said very loudly. “I was just telling him that, and I told him that you …”

“Robert!” Ned interrupted harshly, fearing whatever the man might actually say to Catelyn in this state. “My lady wife has no need to hear anything discourteous.”

Robert laughed then, seeming to find a joke in Ned’s words. “Maybe I should tell you some secrets, Cat. You might like them better than old Ned, here.” he said, leaning in much too closely to Catelyn and staring rather obviously down the front of her gown. Ned seethed, remembering the way he’d grabbed at the two serving girls and finding it much too easy to imagine him pawing at his wife in a similar fashion.

Catelyn, obviously aware how near his breaking point he was, put a warning hand on his arm and with her other hand, tapped Robert’s arm gently. “Oh no, Your Grace,” she said lightly. “I think you should keep your secrets to yourself. But I have a few I need to share with my lord husband.”

With that, she pulled on Ned’s arm, and he found himself being led back into the main Hall before Robert could say anything.

“I believe King Robert may require your assistance, Ser Barristan,” Catelyn said smoothly to the old knight in the white cloak who stood just outside the entrance to the alcove. She didn’t stop walking until she had led Ned out onto the center of the dance floor.

“Cat, I …”

“Dance with me, Ned. We’ll look odd simply standing here in the middle of everyone dancing.”

He sighed and put his arms up to hold her as they began moving in time to the music.

“What happened back there …Robert is very drunk, and he …”

“I noticed,” she said dryly. “Ned, anyone nearby could hear what he was saying to you. I couldn’t let it continue for fear he’d shame himself or you terribly, but I didn’t want to bring anyone else near. Ser Barristan heard everything, of course, but he’ll say nothing against Robert. He’s a knight of the Kingsguard.”

“And what did you hear?” Ned asked fearfully, remembering Robert’s remarks about Jon Snow’s origins.

“Nothing I cared to listen to,” she said vaguely.

When the music ended, she kept him on the dance floor for another song, much to his dismay, but when that one ended, she smiled. “There. We’ve remained here long enough after Robert’s departure for everyone to be aware that you are leaving the Hall this evening with your wife.”

Ned realized he hadn’t even given Robert’s whereabouts another thought. “Robert didn’t come back into the Hall?”

“No,” she said. “There must be another way out of that alcove.”

“There is,” he said, swallowing hard as he remembered who else had left by that exit.

Catelyn nodded. “I assume Ser Barristan got the good king escorted safely to whatever pursuits interested him this evening. Of course, I don’t know how capable the man will be of pursuing anything in his condition.”

Ned stared at his wife, rather shocked at her blunt words. It must have shown on his face because she laughed at him. “Eddard Stark, you have been wed to me for a decade now. Do believe me to be a fool?”

“Gods no!” he said fervently, and she laughed again as she put her hand on his arm, effectively leading him toward the doorways leading out of the Great Hall even as she made it appear that he led her.

“That’s good,” she said. “I am under no illusion that Robert’s behavior tonight is atypical of him. Several rather bawdy stories were told of our king by my dinner companions, in fact, and several men and ladies were quite interested in hearing about any adventures the two of you might have enjoyed together in your youth.”

“Oh gods, Cat. I’m sorry.”

“Why? You weren’t the one of the people being rude. I managed to quiet them pretty quickly, my love. I assure you. But then you disappeared shortly after Robert did, and I thought mayhap I should find you.”

“And then make it very clear to everyone here that I have not deserted my lady wife to accompany our king in his pursuits, as you called them?”

“Precisely,” she said with a satisfied smile. “I won’t have you whispered about, my lord.”

“Ah, so this has been a carefully planned performance on your part.”

“Well,” she admitted, as they finally made it out of the Hall and began walking through the corridors toward their shared chamber. “Making you dance with me for a bit so that everyone saw us together there after Robert disappeared was a bit of a performance.” She smiled up at him. “Getting you to leave with me now was something else entirely.”

“Oh?”

“Yes.” She stopped him then and tiptoed up until her face was close to his. “Can I tell you a secret?”

He raised his brow at her and nodded. She then put her lips so close to his ear that he could feel her warm breath tickle him as she whispered. His breath came more quickly as he listened to his very proper lady wife, this woman who had so carefully plotted to keep any stain of Robert’s bad behavior from touching him, begin describe to him in shockingly vivid detail what she would like him to do when they got back to their chamber.

When she finished speaking and moved away to look up at him once more, he found himself unable to speak. Apparently afraid she had shocked him, her cheeks colored.

“You did say you wished to make use of the bed, my lord,” she said demurely.

“Indeed, I did, my lady,” Ned said, finding his voice at last. “Indeed, I did.”

He then grabbed her around the waist and propelled her toward their chambers as quickly as he possibly could without causing them both to trip over her skirts.


	51. How Do I Let You Go?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was written as a gift fic for starkfish on tumblr. (SomeEnchantedEve here on AO3)
> 
> It's a brief scene in Catelyn's bedchamber during Robert's visit to Winterfell during A Game of Thrones. Ned must leave to go hunting with Robert this morning, and he reflects on the difficulty of leaving her now, and how much more difficult his departure for King's Landing will be.

He awoke when it was still dark to find her curled against him like a kitten, her face against his chest and her knees tucked half under him. She was likely cold as he had apparently thrown the furs off both of them in his sleep, and she was covered only by the leg he had over hers and his arm which still rested protectively over her.

He softly stroked her back and allowed his fingers to run through the hair that lay tangled over it before reaching, slowly and gently lest he wake her, for the fur that lay just behind her. He pulled it to cover her sleeping form and recalled how they’d both wakened in the deepest hours of the night to come together once more in wordless need of each other. He felt a stirring in his cock even now at the memory and sighed. The hunt was to leave at dawn which could not be far off. He could not wake her now.

Things had not been precisely easy between them in these past few days. Their argument about his accepting the position as Robert’s Hand, Lysa Arryn’s letter, Cat’s tangible grief at the impending departure of himself and three of the children, his lingering resentment, however unfair, that she refused to consider Jon’s remaining here—all these things lay heavy between them and had too often made words difficult since the decisions had been made.

Yet, whatever tensions lay between them, that wordless thing that bound them together—that tether between their hearts that had grown inexplicably stronger with each passing year—was more powerful. So they came together in the darkness of her bedchamber each night and allowed their heated touches to express what their lips would not or could not. Neither of them wanted this separation. They belonged to each other as certainly as Ned belonged to the North, and in moments like this one, his heart was nearly stopped by the crushing realization that he would not hold her for more moons than either of them cared to contemplate. They would likely live apart even longer than they had during Robert’s Rebellion …and he had not loved her then. He loved her now, though. Gods, he loved her now, and the thought of not holding her, not seeing her face …

She made a soft little sound and moved her hand against his chest, and he realized he had gripped her to him more tightly as his mind filled with the painful thought of letting her go. With a great effort of will, he removed his arm from around her and rolled to face away from her in preparation to rise.

 _How am I to leave her?_ he thought desolately. _How am I to leave Robb and Rickon and Jon?_ Jon, at least, seemed pleased that he was getting his way about joining the Night’s Watch, although there was still something melancholy in his demeanor since Ned had told him he would be going north to the Wall with Benjen. The boy assured him it was what he truly wanted, but Ned couldn’t help but feel that he also wanted something else—something he would not name. Robb was bravely trying to be a man about being left behind as the Stark in Winterfell, but Ned knew he envied his siblings their adventure. Rickon was just a babe. He wouldn’t truly understand what all the departures meant until after they had gone. And then he would know only that he had been left. _Will he even remember me by the time I see him again?_

Bran and Sansa truly seemed the most content of all the children. Bran was positively glowing with excitement at the thought of knights and adventure, and Sansa was dreaming of life at court as the betrothed of the crown prince even if Ned did sense that she was a bit disappointed her mother wouldn’t be coming. Arya wanted no part of this, however, and had actually asked him if she could remain at Winterfell. When he’d told her no, she’d run to Catelyn to beg her mother to let her stay, and Ned had seen the way his wife’s heart broke as their younger daughter cried into her skirt, but she had remained firm with her, and Arya hadn’t asked again. He hoped she was reconciled to living in King’s Landing, but he feared she was still unhappy about it.

 _We have no choice,_ he told himself for what seemed the thousandth time, and he started to rise from the bed. Before he could do so, though, Catelyn scooted against him, putting her arm around his waist, tucking her knees behind his, and pressing herself against his back.

“Cat?” he said.

She didn’t answer, and a smile came to his lips as he realized she was still asleep. He’d learned long ago that when he moved from her in bed, she would frequently move to him, even as she slumbered, seeking his warmth. He lay there a moment simply reveling in the feel of her against him once more, but the smile faded as he realized he had only one more night to lie with her like this. Today they would hunt and then feast. Tomorrow they would depart. And he would lie in a lonely bed in the hot, stinking south. And she would lie here alone and cold.

 _How am I to leave her?_ Muffled shouts from the courtyard below reminded him he did have to leave her now. Robert would be wroth if he delayed the hunt. Ned was hardly overly concerned with Robert’s feelings at the moment, given what the man had come here and asked of him, but he would rather have his last day in Winterfell unmarred by arguments with anyone.

Sighing, he gently moved Catelyn’s arm from around him and rose from the bed, tucking the furs all around her as he stood to help compensate for the loss of his body heat. She didn’t move as he dressed, and when he was prepared to leave, he turned to look at her lying in the bed.

Dawn’s grey light was just beginning to creep in through the windows, and her lovely face lay there on the pillow, her pale skin illuminated by the dim rays. Her impossible hair—that shimmering, multifaceted sea of varying red hues—almost glowed upon the pillow around that face.

“How am I to let you go?” he whispered as looked at her. He swallowed tightly, almost embarrassed to realize he’d spoken aloud in spite of the fact that none were present to hear save his wife. His Cat. And she was lost in dreams.

He walked to the bed and softly kissed her forehead as she slept. “I do love you, my lady,” he said clearly before turning to walk out into the corridor.

He left too quickly to see the smile that had curved her lips at his words or the tear that slid down her cheek from her still closed eye as she, too, wondered how she was ever to truly let him go.


	52. Always the Two of Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This little story was written for a Ned/Cat week on tumblr. The prompt was "New Year's." It's a pretty fluffy modern AU.
> 
> It’s well after midnight, and all the kids (and their kids) have gone home or up to bed. Ned and Catelyn find themselves alone together. Contemplation of the family they've built, reminiscence, and a bit of romance ensue.

Catelyn Stark jumped as she felt a hand on her shoulder.

“It’s only me, Cat. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

She shifted on the couch and rubbed at her eyes. “What time is it? Did I fall asleep?”

Her husband chuckled. “It’s about two-thirty. And yes, but only a little bit ago. I was sweeping up that cookie crumb mess behind the tree in the playroom when you said you were going to wash the wine glasses. But when I came back here I found you sound asleep sitting up.”

“Two-thirty,” she yawned. “I don’t remember the last time I was up at two-thirty.” She shook her head. “I guess I’m getting old. But I’d better get those glasses cleaned. I don’t want to wake up to them in the sink.”

“They’re clean.”

“What?”

“I washed them before I woke you.” He bent and kissed the top of her head. “I did make certain you weren’t about to topple over into the floor first.” 

“Ned! You should have let me get them. You’ve done more than your fair share of the clean-up.”

“You did all of the cooking,” he countered. “And you cleaned the place from top to bottom before the kids came over. It’s my turn.”

“Mmm,” she said as he stood behind her, rubbing both of her shoulders now. “Come sit with me a minute. I know we should go to bed but I’m not sure I have the energy to walk up the stairs.”

He laughed as he came around the couch to sit beside her. “Shall I have to carry you up, then? I don’t think I’ve done that since you were foolish enough to let Robert Baratheon mix your drinks at your fortieth birthday party, but I could probably still manage it.”

“Oh, god! Don’t remind me of that night! I’m still embarrassed and it’s been more than twelve years!”

“You were beautiful.”

“I was a mess.”

“You were a beautiful mess.”

She laughed and shook her head at him. “Well, as tired as my old bones may be, I promise to make it up the stairs under my own power. I think I’ve had maybe two glasses of wine all night. I didn’t even have champagne at midnight.”

“What?” he asked in mock horror. “That’s sacrilege. Almost as terrible as your leaving me with no one to kiss.”

“Not true,” she reminded him. “Lyanna told me very clearly that she kissed Grandpa at midnight just like her Mommy kissed her Daddy.”

Ned laughed. “Well, it was hardly the same. But when Jon grabbed Ygritte and kissed her, Ricky groaned and made gagging noises and Lya jumped into my lap and demanded a kiss of her own. As you’d so cruelly abandoned me, I made do with kissing our sweet granddaughter on her little red head and both cheeks which seemed to please her greatly. Of course, Leyton looked around at all the kissing then and demanded that his mother kiss him so I fear poor Willas got shorted on his midnight kiss almost as badly as I did.”

“Oh, poor man,” Catelyn said, patting her husband’s cheek in mock sympathy. “You could have been upstairs with Robb and Jeyne and me dealing with three crying children to ring in the New Year.” She shook her head. “I swear little Robby’s colic is as bad as Arya’s ever was. I don’t know how Jeyne ever gets anything done. And little Alison doesn’t understand why her mother’s so taken up with the baby. Poor Robb was trying his best with her but she kept begging for Jeyne. Between her screaming and Robby’s wailing, it’s no wonder they woke Brynden. I’m astounded Valerie stayed asleep.”

Ned shrugged. “Valerie’s a lot like her father. Almost unnaturally quiet. Jon and Ygritte deserve her after their older two.”

Catelyn smiled. “Oh, Ricky isn’t that bad. He’s just spoiled a bit. It comes from being first. Arya, Bran, and Rickon treated him like a new toy when he was born, and Robb was even worse about indulging him until he finally settled down and started having his own children.”

“So you’re saying Lyanna is bad then,” Ned teased her.

“Absolutely not. But I will say she’s well named. That child will challenge them every chance she gets, and you know it.”

“Ah, you’re referring to her middle name then.”

Catelyn smacked him on the arm, but she smiled. She’d cried four years ago when Jon had placed his newborn daughter into her arms rather than Ned’s as he’d announced her name to the family. _We’ve decided to call her after my mothers. Lyanna Catelyn._

That moment still made her tear up whenever she remembered it. Lyanna Stark had been a force of nature. She’d been impossible not to like for she’d been generous and loving and loyal to a fault. But she’d also been reckless and too often careless both of herself and of the people she loved best. She’d never even told them the name of Jon’s father, simply showing up with a baby on Ned and Catelyn’s doorstep one rainy evening asking for a place to stay. They’d taken her in, of course, in spite of the fact that they’d just had Robb and were still trying to adjust to becoming parents themselves. Three months later she’d gone, leaving Jon behind, and Catelyn had resented it. Resented Jon for taking time and attention from Ned and herself that should have been focused on Robb. Resented Lyanna for the way she’d breeze in and out of all their lives over the next eight years, sometimes staying for months and other times only days, disrupting everything. She’d watched Jon weather his mother’s comings and goings with a remarkable steadiness for one so young, but she’d known it confused him. He knew Lyanna was his mother and he loved her, but it was Catelyn who cooked his meals and put him to bed most nights. For the first eight and a half years of his life, he had kept himself a bit closed off from her for fear of disloyalty to his mother, and she had done the same with him for fear of making her own children feel less loved. He’d been a child. She’d been a foolish, resentful woman. After Lyanna’s death (she’d been hit head on by a drunk driver and, being Lyanna, hadn’t been wearing her seatbelt), something had broken inside Jon, and Catelyn had broken a little herself to see it. From that point forward, she’d opened her heart to him completely, endeavoring to heal his heart from both from the loss of his mother and any sense of not belonging to their family that she’d had a hand in creating. It had taken time, and it hadn’t always been easy, but when Jon had decided at age twenty that he wanted to drop out of college and join the army, it had been Catelyn he’d come to first. Two years later, he’d come first to her again when his girlfriend was pregnant, and he had to figure out what he was going to do. He loved and respected Ned more than anyone on earth, but he was also painfully afraid of disappointing him in any way. Catelyn had learned over the years how to help the two ridiculously taciturn men communicate with each other.

Now, of course, she couldn’t even imagine their lives without Jon and Ygritte in them. And six year old Rickard, four year old Lyanna, and two year old Valerie were their grandchildren—no different from Sansa’s or Robb’s children in the eyes of anyone in the Stark family.

“Where are you, my love?” Ned asked her softly.

She leaned against him and laid her head on his shoulder. “Right here. I was just thinking about what a fine family Jon has made for himself.”

“Well, Ygritte helped,” Ned said, putting an arm around her.

“Of course. I just mean . . . I’m proud of him, Ned. And you should be even prouder. He models himself after you. He always has.”

“Well, I must say I approve of his taste in women’s hair color.”

She laughed at him. “Just how much have you had to drink tonight, Eddard Stark? You’re full of witty remarks.”

“Are you saying I’m dull when I’m sober?”

“Not in the least. But you must admit you’re in an awfully lighthearted mood for two-thirty a.m.”

“Sleep deprivation,” he responded. “And it’s probably closer to three now.”

“Three o’clock! For heaven’s sake, how late do you suppose the boys intend to stay out?”

“The ‘boys’ are eighteen and twenty-two, Cat, if you are referring to Bran and Rickon. And the party they were going to when they left is closer to Jojen Reed’s apartment than here. Bran mentioned they might want to crash there and asked if I cared if he didn’t bring Rickon home until tomorrow. I did tell them to call.”

“Check your phone.”

“It hasn’t rung.”

“Rickon doesn’t call,” she sighed. “He texts. And you’re notorious for missing text messages.”

He made a face at her, but pulled his phone from its holder on his belt. “I hate the way you’re always right,” he said as he looked at the screen. “A text from Rickon—Dad, party probably going til morning. We’ll crash at Jo’s eventually. See you late tomorrow.”

She frowned. “Rickon’s under age, Ned.”

“And he’s a college freshman. You and I both drank a bit in college, although I daresay Rick likely puts us to shame.”

“Ned!”

“You are familiar with our youngest son, are you not, Cat? Truth be told, I’m rather impressed he wasn’t pushing Bran to leave here before midnight. We’ve raised a good kid, but he’s definitely got a bit of a taste for wine, women, and song.”

She frowned at this description of her baby, accurate though she knew it to be. 

“And Bran will look after him. If the boy is going to party all night long, I’d sooner it be with Bran than a bunch of other underage idiots from college.”

She hated the way Ned could be so rational and realistic when it came to the boys. Of course, she could count on him to leap into overprotective mode when it came to the girls, so she supposed it was only fair.

“I think they enjoyed themselves here tonight,” she said. “Bran and Rickon, I mean. They haven’t seen all their nieces and nephews together since Robby’s christening, and that wasn’t really a party like this.”

“It was far too infested with Westerlings to be any kind of party,” Ned muttered.

“Ned! They aren’t that bad. Just a little self-important. That’s all.”

She felt his chest and shoulders move as he shrugged. 

“Anyway, I think all the kids liked everyone being here together,” she continued. “I missed it so much at Christmas—having all six of them with us.”

Ned sighed. “I know, my love. But there are a good deal more than six of them now. Three are married with kids of their own, Arya might as well be married, and Sansa and Robb both have in-laws to contend with.”

Catelyn pulled her feet up onto the couch and snuggled even more against her husband’s chest. “I know,” she said with a slight pout. “But I miss them.” They’d seen all the kids and grandkids at least for a few hours at some point during the week of Christmas, but not together.

Sansa and Will had spent Thanksgiving with Ned and Catelyn and so had taken three year old Leyton and one year old Brynden to Highgarden for Christmas this year to spend it with the Tyrells. They’d made the drive here on the 22nd so the kids could at least open presents from Grandma and Grandpa Stark before they headed south. Robb and Jeyne had spent Christmas Eve here with two year old Alison and baby Robby, along with Bran and Rickon (who had more fun assembling toys late that night than Robb’s young daughter had finding them the following morning), but they’d gotten up very early Christmas morning to head west to Jeyne’s parents without staying for Christmas dinner. Jon and Ygritte had stayed home on Christmas Eve as Lyanna had declared she wanted Santa Claus to come to her house, but they’d come over for Christmas dinner. Arya, ever one to do her own thing, had gone snow skiing with Gendry to celebrate Christmas, showing up here on December 26th without him, leaving Ned and Catelyn to surmise that the poor man had proposed marriage again only to be turned down once more. He’d asked her at least twice that Catelyn knew of over the course of their five year on-again, off-again relationship, but Arya had long maintained that her parents, Jon, and Sansa were all insane for marrying in their early twenties, and she was having no part of it. _For God’s sake, I can’t let ROBB be the only person in this family with any sense at all!_ she’d proclaimed more than once. Whatever had happened over Christmas between them appeared to be all forgiven now if Ned’s rather scandalized description of that particular pair’s midnight kiss was anything to judge by.

“Holidays are difficult, Cat,” he said now. “You remember how we were forever driving ourselves crazy trying to please your father and mine when the kids were little.”

“I know,” she sighed. “Am I terrible for being sort of grateful that Ygritte doesn’t really have any family other than ours?”

Ned laughed at her. “You’re honest. As usual. Gendry doesn’t have any family either, you know. He won’t have a damn thing to do with Robert, and I can’t really say I blame him.”

“No,” Catelyn said thoughtfully. “But Arya does a fine job of coming up with places to be other than here all on her own.”

Ned laughed. “That’ll change.”

“What do you mean?”

“It isn’t home that Arya’s avoiding, my love. It’s exposing Gendry to all the marriage and procreation going on in the family that disturbs her. She’s afraid it gives him ideas.”

“Well, it should. I realize Arya’s only twenty-four, but Gendry is nearly thirty. If she doesn’t make up her mind what she wants before too long, she may find out it’s too late.”

“Oh, she wants him.” He was silent a moment, and Catelyn had to suppress a laugh because she could almost feel him frowning from where she leaned against him. “I could do with her expressing her wants with a bit more restraint in my living room, but she wants him. She just chafes at the idea of not being completely in charge of her own life. She always has. But Gendry isn’t going anywhere.”

“You sound awfully certain of yourself, Mr. Stark.”

Ned laughed. “He’s as stubborn as she is. Maybe more so.” Catelyn felt his lips on the side of her face then, and she twisted in his arms to look at him. “And he looks at our daughter the way I look at you. He could no more walk away from her than he could stop breathing, Cat.”

The way Ned’s eyes looked at her now almost made Catelyn stop breathing. Thirty years, she’d been married to this man, and he could still take her breath away. “Is it possible to make up a kiss missed at midnight?” she whispered.

He answered by putting his lips on hers and not taking them away for a good long time. When they finally did break the kiss, he still looked at her as if she were everything he’d ever wanted. She swallowed, and brushed her fingers over the lines at the corners of his eyes. “If Gendry truly looks at our daughter like that, and she doesn’t marry him, we’ve raised a fool, Ned.”

He laughed at her. “We’ve raised an interesting crop of children, my love, but there’s not a fool among them. Give her a couple years. Even Robb gave up the playboy life at twenty-six. She’ll come around. And Willas was over thirty before he and Sansa got married. Don’t worry about Arya, my love.”

Catelyn started laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Ned asked her.

“You are. Or I am. I was actually thinking to myself earlier that, while you tend to be more rational than I do when it comes to the boys, you are the crazy worrier about the girls, and listen to you now! You’re making me look bad.”

“You couldn’t look bad if you tried. Not even in the wee hours of the morning after putting on a world class soiree for the most important nineteen people in all the world—seven of whom happen to be under seven and rather demanding.”

“Now you’re being silly again. But as for this party, I loved doing it. I can’t believe they were all free for New Year’s. Wasn’t it wonderful, Ned?”

“It was. But it’s getting later by the minute, Cat. If we sit here much longer, Sansa will find us here in the morning. Or more likely, Leyton, although I hope both boys let their poor mother sleep in a little bit.”

“I practically had to chase her up the stairs,” Catelyn sighed. “She kept insisting on helping me clean up even though I told her that’s what I keep you around for.”

“She just wants to take care of you. You raised her, Cat. She can’t help wanting to help.”

Catelyn frowned at him. “Well, it’s still my job to take care of her. I’m fifty-two, not eighty-two, and I didn’t spend nearly five hours in a car with two very small boys to get here today.” She sighed. “I’m glad she finally let me run her off to bed. Willas carried Leyton up as soon as Robb and Jon got all their sleepy babies out the door—before Gendry and Arya left. I’m glad Sansa and Willas both got a few extra days off work, too. We don’t get to see them often enough, and I’m excited about having them here for a couple more nights.”

Robb and Jon and their families both lived within a reasonable distance, but Sansa and her husband had careers that kept them in the capital. They seemed to love their life in the city and declared their location was perfect because it was pretty much exactly halfway between their respective parents’ homes, but Catelyn missed her daughter and hated that she saw Leyton and Brynden so much less frequently than her other five grandchildren. 

“Well, Grandma, I should get you to bed so that you’ve got the energy to chase two little boys around tomorrow,” Ned said with a grin.

“Just give me a push, Grandpa, and I’ll get up,” she laughed.

He gave her a half-hearted shove, and she stood up laughing and pulled him up after her. He pretended to fall forward into her and put his arms around her tightly, nearly crushing her against him as he kissed her again.

“What was that for?” she asked him, when he finally let her come up for air.

“I can’t help myself. I know we have seven grandchildren, but you don’t look like any damn grandma I’ve ever seen.”

“Well, when you kiss me like that, I don’t feel like anybody’s grandma, either.”

They stood there in the living room with their arms around each other, grinning at each other like idiots. _Sleep deprivation,_ Catelyn thought. _We’re slap happy._

“I don’t think I’ve officially wished you Happy New Year yet, Mrs. Stark,” Ned said then, still smiling at her. 

“You haven’t,” she said.

“Well, then, I feel like I ought to give a speech of some sort.”

“Oh, god.” 

“Because it’s the thirtieth time I’ve had the privilege of saying to you, Happy New Year, Mrs. Stark.” He grinned at her, a goofy sort of lopsided grin that caused her to wonder again just how much he’d had to drink. “Thank you for being Mrs. Stark,” he continued, his expression growing more serious and his voice husky. “This night . . . our children . . . their children. It all comes back to you, Cat.”

“To us,” she whispered. “It’s been both of us. Always.”

He nodded and leaned his forehead down to touch it to hers. “Thirty years ago, we were in that stupid little apartment with the uneven floors and that crazy man upstairs with the parrot that screamed random obscenities all day long.”

“And sometimes all night, too,” she laughed. “I remember. We’d been married all of four months that New Year’s.”

“And we were saving for a house and you didn’t want to go out anywhere expensive . . .”

“And you brought home that cheap bottle of champagne . . .” 

“And you wouldn’t drink any of it, and you were acting all strange and nervous . . .”

“Because I’d taken that stupid test and I was so afraid you’d be angry because we hadn’t planned for it.”

He moved his hands to hold her face. “That was the beginning of all this craziness, and I wouldn’t change it for the world.” He smiled at her. “Do you remember how you told me?”

She nodded. “Word for word. You got so frustrated with me acting like a crazy person, you finally said, ‘What the hell is wrong with you, Cat? It’s our first married New Year’s. Don’t you want to celebrate?’”

“God, I was an ass.”

“No. You didn’t know. And I was such an idiot about it. When you asked me that, I said, ‘I’m having a baby. Please don’t hate me!’ And you just stared at me for what seemed like a million years. And then you grabbed me and told me you loved me. And you kissed me. And you kept on saying you loved me and kissing me over and over.”

“And we ended up ringing in the New Year naked on that uneven floor as I recall. We didn’t even make it to the bedroom.”

“No, we didn’t,” she whispered. “But when we did finally crawl into bed, you promised me that we’d be in a house before our baby was born and that he would be the most incredible baby the world had ever seen and that our life would be even more wonderful now than before.”

“And you cried. You cried and told me that since I said it, you believed it.”

“And I was right. You kept every one of those promises, Ned. And every promise since.”

“Because I love you. Because I love us together. Every new year is a like a promise as long as I have you with me. I loved having all the children around us when they were small, but I also loved putting them in their beds and having you all to myself again each night. I loved having the whole crazy, noisy, champagne-swilling, cookie-crumbling bunch of them here tonight, but right now I’m glad it’s only the two of us. Because all the best things in my life have come from the two of us. You surprised the hell out of me that first New Year’s Eve, and you haven’t stopped surprising me since. I cannot wait to spend another year loving you. So Happy New Year, Mrs. Stark.”

She couldn’t stop the tears that spilled from her eyes. “Wow,” she said when she found her voice. “You weren’t kidding about making a speech.”

“I don’t tell you often enough what you mean to me, Cat. I don’t even know how to tell you what you mean to me.”

“Oh, you did just fine, Ned. Believe me.” They still stood in the quiet living room, touching each other and gazing at each other like two lovestruck kids, and she noticed they were swaying slightly. It had to be after three a.m. now. If they didn’t lie down soon, they’d likely fall down. However tired she was, though, she found she was no longer remotely sleepy. Every part of her that touched Ned seemed to spark with an electric current. “Happy New Year, Mr. Stark. Shall we celebrate it like we did thirty years ago?”

He looked at her and smiled. “Are you sure, Cat? It’s very, very late.”

“No it isn’t. It’s very, very early. And yes, I’m sure.” She kissed him softly, and then moved her hands over his body, reveling in the way he responded to her touch as he deepened the kiss. 

When he started to unbutton her blouse, she stopped him with a smile. “Take me to bed, Mr. Stark. I’m more than willing to get naked with you, but I’m afraid I’m not quite up to doing it on a floor tonight, not even our carpeted, perfectly level, floor.

He laughed out loud then, a rich deep sound full of joy and love and desire. A laugh that she had heard many times over the years and knew no one else had. This particular laugh belonged to her Ned—the Ned that she alone knew--and she began to laugh with him. Then she turned and ran for the staircase knowing he’d chase her. By the time they reached their bedroom, they were both out of breath, giggling like children, and nearly too tired to get each other’s clothes off. 

But get naked, they did. And they christened the first morning of this New Year as they had so many before, perhaps not with quite the youthful vigor of thirty years prior, but with no less passion or desire, and with infinitely more knowledge of each other’s bodies and souls. When at last they lay exhausted and satisfied in each other’s arms, his words came back to her as she drifted off to sleep.

_Every new year is a like a promise as long as I have you with me._

_You have me, my love,_ she thought. _And I have you. And that’s a promise worth building a life on—year in and year out._


	53. Now, Still, and Always

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was written for the lovely SomeEnchantedEve who was sad about the lack of a certain sexy fic event over on LJ. I'm not on LJ so I dont know that much about it, but she said a nice sexy drabble would cheer her up a bit. :)
> 
> After twenty years of marriage, Ned FINALLY gets Catelyn to leave town without the kids for more than just a day for an anniversary trip to the Big Easy. Between the atmosphere of New Orleans and the very potent drinks, Ned finds himself enjoying one of the best nights of his life with the woman he still doesn't think he deserves.
> 
> WARNING: This is more explicit than my usual stories when it comes to writing sexual situations. I'm not changing the rating of this entire collection for this one little story, but if you do not wish to read an explicit sex scene, you might want to skip this one.

Ned Stark felt his wife’s hand slip out of his, and he smiled as he watched her raise both hands above her head in response to the man who had called out to her from the balcony above.

“Catch, Red!” the man shouted as he tossed the strand of brightly colored plastic beads down to her.

She caught them easily and laughed as she slipped them over her head. “Thank you!” She called upward, the soft, southern lilt in her voice slightly more pronounced than usual just as it always was any time she’d had alcohol to drink.

“Ned,” she said turning back to face him. “This is so much fun!” Her cheeks were slightly flushed and whether that was a result of the cooler air since the sun had long since gone down or the rum in those fruity concoctions she’d fallen in love with, he didn’t know. He didn’t much care, thinking only how beautiful she looked in the middle of this street clogged with laughing, noisy people. Impulsively, she threw her arms around his neck (for that, he could definitely thank the rum, as Catelyn was not given to embracing him on crowded streets) and whispered, “Thank you for this,” into his ear.

Her breath was warm against his neck and chest and caused him to wish very much that they were back in their hotel room away from the insanity of Bourbon Street on a Saturday night with Mardi Gras less than a month away. It seemed the city of New Orleans started celebrating earlier than the appointed date, or perhaps the French Quarter was always this way on Saturday nights. Having never been here before, Ned didn’t really know. This type of crowded, uninhibited party atmosphere had never appealed to him much, but he’d been determined to take his wife away for their anniversary. Twenty years of marriage to this woman was something to be celebrated, and as his warm blooded southern wife would not likely appreciate a cold weather vacation in late January and he would be hot and miserable on some tropical beach, the January climate of southern Louisiana had seemed a reasonable compromise.

New Orleans had been Sansa’s suggestion, actually, when he’d mentioned to his two oldest children that he’d like to take their mother away for a few days to celebrate the anniversary. In the nineteen years since Robb’s birth, she had never gone away for more than one night from the children, and he’d known she’d balk at leaving them for three or four. He’d sought to enlist Robb’s and Sansa’s help in encouraging her, and they had been wildly enthusiastic. Robb had promised to spend extra time with eight year old Rickon during the trip to keep him from repeatedly calling Catelyn with pleas to come home, and sixteen year old Sansa had started surfing travel sites on her laptop. Knowing her mother’s fondness for good southern food and jazz music, she’d eventually pronounced New Orleans to be the perfect destination, and after she’d shown him all the things to see and do there which didn’t involve drunken hordes on Bourbon Street, Ned had agreed with her. 

Now, after two days of sightseeing, shopping, and eating too much all over New Orleans, he’d relented to Catelyn’s request to ‘just see what happens there at night’. He had somehow become a part of that drunken horde and discovered that he didn’t mind it so much after all—not with Catelyn draped around him giggling in his ear. As he fought back a sudden urge to grab her more tightly to him and kiss her right in the middle of the street, he realized that he wasn’t precisely sober himself.

“I’m afraid I’m a bit drunk, Mr. Stark,” she said, pulling her arms from around his neck and tucking one around his arm and leaning her head against his shoulder as they began to walk again. 

“Oh, you are drunk, Mrs. Stark,” he said with a laugh. “But I don’t mind.”

“I’m not embarrassing you, am I?”

“No,” he said firmly. “You couldn’t possibly embarrass me, my love. Every man here wishes he could be me simply because I’m with you.”

“Ha. I’m the oldest woman out here, Ned. Half these girls barely look twenty-one, and the boys—well I know they must be twenty-one, but they look no older than Robb.”

“You keep looking up at the balconies,” he chuckled, “and I admit most of those party-goers look alarmingly young. Down here in the street, however, I see people from fifteen to eighty. I’d say we’re somewhere in the middle of the demographic.”

“Demographic?” she laughed. “You’re cute when you talk like you’re giving a business report.”

“You’re cute when you slur your words.”

She stopped and hit his arm. “I am not slurring my words, Eddard Stark!” She laughed as she stumbled just a bit over the ‘st’ in Stark. “Okay. Maybe just a tiny little bit.”

More shouts from above drew her attention, but when she caught the eye of the young man dangling beads over the balcony rail this time, he snatched them back and roared, “Show us your tits!”

She frowned disapprovingly at him, giving him the same icy glare she would turn on Rickon for sneaking cookies just before dinner or Bran and Arya for fighting over the xbox controllers. Then she tugged on Ned’s arm to move him along as he laughed at her.

Most of the people tossing beads down were simply having fun and tossing the cheap colored necklaces at any friendly person below. Catelyn’s fiery hair and bright smile had earned her a rather large collection at this point, and the brightly colored beads lay against the light blue of her sweater like a particularly showy rainbow. Ordinarily, she wouldn’t be caught dead wearing anything so gaudy, but here the beads seemed to suit the environment, and she grinned more widely with every new color she added to her collection.

The first invitation to lift up her shirt had caused her eyes to go wide with shock. She’d stood there stunned for a moment before turning to Ned and saying in a rather prim voice. “Does that man not realize I am old enough to be his mother?”

“You aren’t,” Ned had laughed as he’d pulled her away, fearful that she’d actually shout something of that nature back at the offending bead tosser. “You are forty-four, my love and that man looks to be close to thirty. I have no doubt that old Hoster kept you locked up pretty tightly at fifteen or sixteen, so you couldn’t possibly . . .”

She’d smacked his arm then just as she had a moment ago when he’d accused her (rightly) of slurring her words a bit. “That isn’t the point,” she’d said. “And you aren’t funny. But that’s an awful thing to shout at anybody. I don’t know if I like this part of New Orleans.”

Fortunately, at least five people had tossed her beads without any lewd suggestions at all shortly after that, restoring her faith in humanity and her willingness to explore Bourbon Street further. Several hours had passed since then filled with gawking at the sights, stopping into various clubs, listening to bands, and even dancing a few times when she dragged him onto the floor. After drinking two of the deceptively potent Hurricanes earlier in the evening, Ned had stuck to beer. Catelyn continued to order the highly alcoholic fruit juice in spite of his teasing her about the dangers of drinking anything named after storms powerful enough to level this city. Now it was past midnight, her bead collection had grown large enough that he feared it might start to strain her neck, and he seriously wanted to get his inebriated wife back to the hotel.

Catelyn rarely drank more than two glasses of wine. When she did drink any more, he’d found her to be deliciously uninhibited and rather more aggressive in bed. Not that she was ever prudish about sex. The two of them had discovered early that they had quite the physical chemistry and time had done little to dampen that. On the contrary, the trust between the two of them which had developed over twenty years of married sex (and nearly two years of pre-marital sex carefully kept quiet even to this day lest the incredibly strict Catholic Hoster Tully hear about it) had led them to ever increasing levels of comfort with any number of ways of pleasing each other. Still, a truly drunk Cat was a fairly unusual treat, and he was more than ready to have her all to himself.

“Drunken fools,” she murmured under her breath as they walked on down the street through the sea of people. The crowds showed no sign of lessening in spite of late hour.

“You mean us?” he laughed.

“Of course not,” she said, lifting up her chin. “We may be drunk, but we are certainly not fools.”

Her voice was a bit louder than she’d intended, likely because of the drinks she’d had, and two men standing in the doorway of a club from which blared some loud music to which some very drunk girls were singing dreadful, off-key karaoke heard her and laughed.

“Well, he’s no fool, pretty lady,” one of them said, “Hanging on to you. You could do a lot better, though. Why don’t you come in here with us?”

Ned seethed, but he allowed Catelyn to tug on his arm and pull him away. “He’s an idiot,” she hissed. “And I won’t have you getting into some sort of brawl with an idiot.”

 _I don’t brawl,_ Ned thought. He’d been kidded in a mostly good natured sort of way over his good fortune in his wife’s beauty too often through the years to let it bother him most of the time. Yet, he sometimes did still wonder what she ever saw in him. He could still recall the crude but essentially accurate words of his friend Robert Baratheon at his and Cat’s wedding reception twenty years ago. The man had been drinking heavily and complaining about the fact that Ned’s sister still refused to go out with him.

_“How the fuck did you do it, Stark?”_

_“Do what?”_

_“Look at her! Just look at her!”_

_Ned sighed and looked where Robert pointed, thinking he’d see Lyanna dancing with yet another partner. Instead, he realized Robert was staring at his brand new wife as she stood laughing at something her younger brother had said._

_“Cat?” he said stupidly._

_“Yes, you bastard. Cat! She’s a fucking ten, Eddard! She’s drop dead gorgeous without even trying, and she just married YOU!”_

_“Well . . . yes. I know she’s beautiful, and I’m well aware that we’re married now. I was at the wedding, Robert.”_

_“But look at you!” Robert shook his head. “You’re a good guy, Ned. You know I love you like a brother . . . nah, I love you better than I love my brothers—they’re assholes. But look at you! How did a stick-in-the-mud with your face get that stone cold fox to LOOK at you, much less fuck or marry you, for Christ’s sake?”_

Ned had threatened his best friend with violence if he continued to speak so about his wife, and Robert had spent the rest of the reception in sulky silence over Lyanna, but sometimes Robert’s words still came back to him. Sometimes he still asked himself that same question, if not in precisely the same words.

“Toss them down!” Cat called brightly, and he realized that he’d stopped walking as his mind had wandered into unpleasant thoughts. She now stood several yards away from him waving at yet another group on a balcony that must have called down to her.

He took a moment to appreciate the ‘stone cold fox’ who had inexplicably married him. Her appearance had changed in subtle ways over the past two decades, although she remained slim and lovely and far younger looking than her forty-four years. Ned was only six months older than she was, but he thought he looked a good ten years older now.

Last night, she’d worn a sophisticated black dress to the fancy restaurant where they’d dined, and he’d enjoyed just looking at her as much as he’d enjoyed the delicious meal. He’d enjoyed taking that dress off her even more. Tonight, she’d opted for a sweater and jeans to run around outside, and she looked every bit as beautiful to Ned. He particularly liked the way this pair of jeans hugged her ass. He watched it move as she bounced up and down slightly waving up at the balcony and thought about how perfectly it filled up his hands when he grabbed hold of it to pull her more tightly against him. That thought drove all negative memories from his mind but also increased the blood flow to regions below his waist, and he decided it was time to ask her if she was ready to call it a night.

“Oh!” she said, jumping as the beads sailed over her head and to her left. To Ned’s surprise, she turned and bent to retrieve them. Previously, she had just shrugged and smiled and let poorly tossed beads lie on the pavement. There were dozens of the cheap little necklaces lying about, at least half of them broken.

He didn’t ponder her reasons for going after this particular one as his current view of her ass now caused him to contemplate the way it felt pressed up against his lower belly when he . . . _Christ, Stark! Think of something else!_ His own jeans had begun to feel rather tighter in the front, and if he continued allowing his thoughts to wander in this direction, the walk back to the hotel would be very uncomfortable indeed.

“Look!” she said triumphantly, standing up, turning to face him, and holding up the little strand of beads as if it were the Holy Grail. “A red one! I didn’t have red, and it’s Rickon’s fav . . .” Suddenly her face fell. “Ned! I didn’t call the children!”

“Yes, you did,” he said, thinking that discussions of their offspring and Catelyn’s guilt at leaving them would at least help ease his current predicament. After all his careful planning, Robb’s and Sansa’s encouragement, his sister-in-law’s agreement to come stay at their house with her own son and take care of the kids, and Benjen’s promise to entertain the kids all weekend, she’d still nearly backed out when she realized she wouldn’t be back in time for Rickon’s parent-teacher conference on Tuesday. Lysa, of all people, had saved the day on that one, calling Rickon’s third grade teacher and asking if the conference could be scheduled for the following week. Thank God, the woman was more than willing to do that. “You called them twice today,” he said firmly. “You spoke to everyone except Arya because she wasn’t home and didn’t answer her cell. But texted you later to say she was hiking with her friends, her service was spotty, and she’d be home in time for church.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Catelyn said absently. “Lysa was taking them all to Mass tonight so Benjen can take them all day tomorrow for skiing. But I didn’t call to say goodnight! I never forgot before!”

“Catelyn, they’re fine. We both have our cell phones. They haven’t called us, either, and if any one of them really needed us, you know they would have.”

She bit her lip. “I suppose so.” Sighing, she put the red strand of beads around her neck. “So, this one is Rickon’s. Now they all have a color they’ll like.” She frowned slightly, “Of course, Arya would likely prefer black, but I think she’ll like the silver all right.”

“They’ll all love all the beads, Cat. And all the stuff you’ve already bought them. And all the stuff you’ll buy them over the next two days. And the new suitcase I’ll buy to pack it all in for the flight home. They’ll love it all. They love you. And they’re fine.”

She nodded. “You will call your brother and tell him to make sure they all wear their helmets on the slopes tomorrow. Especially Bran and Arya as they’ve taken to doing those jumps and stunts. And Rickon, just because . . . he’s Rickon. And . . .”

He pulled her to him and pressed his lips against hers. _I am drunk,_ he thought. He could not once recall kissing his wife full on the lips with his tongue in her mouth in the middle of a busy street in all the years he’d known her. More surprising than his own action was her response as she didn’t pull away or scold him. She opened her mouth to him and wound her arms around him once more, not even breaking the kiss when applause broke out from the balcony above. _She’s even drunker than I am._

“Ned,” she said, somewhat breathless when they did break apart. “I’d like to go back to the hotel now.”

“So would I,” he replied, and the smile she gave him then left him in no doubt that she understood precisely what he wanted.

They half walked, half ran the five remaining blocks to their hotel giggling like a couple of teenagers, and when the elevator doors closed behind them, he pushed her against the wall to kiss her again. He wanted her so badly, he wildly considered hitting the stop button and just having her against the elevator wall, but that wasn’t something people actually did. Certainly nothing he or Catelyn would ever do. Even the hungry kiss they shared now with his hand beneath her sweater making the Mardi Gras beads rattle as he moved it over her breast would never have happened had they been sober. When the doors opened on their floor, they likely wouldn’t have noticed had it not been for the woman waiting to enter the elevator gasping rather loudly as the man with her tried not to laugh. Ned jerked his hands back down to his sides, and Catelyn, with her hair rather obviously disheveled simply smiled at them and said, “Have a lovely evening.” She then stepped out of the elevator with all of regal bearing of a queen, completely refusing to acknowledge the fact that her sweater was still hiked up nearly to her bra on one side.

Once the other couple had gotten on the elevator, she said, “Oh my god!” Then she burst into peals of laughter, grabbed Ned’s hand and raced for their room. She fumbled with her key card, so he took it from her and opened the door only to have her race into the bathroom ahead of him. 

He walked across the room, sat down on the large wingback chair to remove his shoes and began unbuttoning his shirt. He’d just gotten it off when she emerged from the bathroom, disappointingly still fully clothed.

“All yours,” she said brightly.

He stood up and walked into the bathroom himself. Pissing was made a bit difficult by the fact that he was still half hard after the elevator encounter, but he managed it. He washed his hands, brushed his teeth and walked back into the room still wearing his jeans. When he saw his wife, his jaw nearly hit the floor, and as his cock went pretty much rock hard at the sight, the rational part of his brain thought, _She is definitely drunker than I am._

Cat sat on that wingback chair wearing nothing but the multiple strands of colored beads. Her hair fell wildly down around her shoulders, and she had one leg thrown over an arm of the chair which gave him an enticing view of the way the fingers of her right hand lazily moved over the flesh between her legs while her left hand toyed with the beads around her neck.

“Holy God,” he finally managed to gasp.

She smiled at him and leaned back as far as she could in the chair. “I don’t think the nuns at my old school would approve of your using that particular expression in this situation.”

“I don’t give a damn,” he said, nearly staggering as he walked across the floor and knelt down in front of her, running his own hands over the seemingly endless length of those legs. “You are so beautiful.”

“I love you,” she said, moving her hands to caress his face as he looked up at her. “Holy God,” he whispered again, thinking that anyone who found the phrase blasphemous on his lips had never knelt before anything so beautiful, had never loved anyone the way he loved this woman. 

As her fingers moved across his face he caught the index finger of her right hand with his lips and sucked it into his mouth. It tasted of her, and he wanted more. He moved his hands up her legs to grab her hips and pull her toward him as he bent his face to her sex. She jumped at the first touch of his lips to her flesh, and he held her tightly as her hips continued to twist and buck against his mouth.

Every gasp and moan from her lips, every rattle of the little beads as she threw back her head and gave herself completely to the enjoyment of what he was doing drove him to new heights of arousal himself. He let go of her hips with one hand to slide it up the front of her, beneath the multiple necklaces and grasp her breast, teasing the nipple with his thumb. She uttered a phrase that the nuns likely would have rapped her knuckles for at that point, and he smiled as he continued to tease her with his lips and tongue.

Only when she came with a hoarse cry so much louder than he ever got to hear at home where she would bite her lip hard to keep from waking the children did he realize he still wore his pants. The sounds she was making were so erotic, his cock was painfully hard against the fabric, and he feared if she so much as touched it with a finger, he’d come immediately like some horny kid.

Fearful of that, he slowly pushed himself away from her, standing up to look down at her flushed face. She was magnificent, her eyes dark with intoxication and sexual satisfaction, her hair and the gaudy beads making a riot of color against the neutral tones of the chair, her pale skin glistening with a light sheen of perspiration. Her chest heaved up and down as she continued to take deep, ragged breaths.

He smiled down at her. “God, I want you,” he said, somewhat surprised he could get the words out at all. He found his fingers trembling as he reached down to undo his jeans and pull them and his boxers down over his hips. 

When his stiff cock was free of his clothing, he watched her lick her lips as she looked at it. Once he had stepped completely out of his clothing, tossing the pants and boxers aside, she looked back up into his eyes.

“Fuck me, Ned.” 

With those words, Ned consigned his soul to God and let go of all rational thought. While Cat was always an eager lover and not opposed to some dirty talk, that particular phrase was as unusual for her as the pose with which she’d greeted him. Without another word, he reached down, scooped her into his arms and carried her to the bed, more intoxicated by the feel of the legs she wrapped around his waist as he walked and the sound of her laughter than he’d ever been by the rum or the beer.

He laid her down on her back, but when she reached up to pull him down atop her, he shook his head slowly. Instead, he stood at the foot of the bed and pulled her ankles up over his shoulders, pulling her hips to the very edge of the bed. Then he put his hands once more on her hips and raised them off the bed just enough so that the sweet wetness between her legs brushed against his cock causing him to breathe in sharply.

He looked at her, questioning silently.

She smiled up at him, squeezed the base of his neck just slightly between her ankles and nodded. Then she reached up with her hand, grabbed his cock and put its tip just inside her. “Yes,” she whispered.

He plunged himself all the way into her in one thrust, and he heard her gasp, but she repeated the word ‘yes’ and so he let go his restraint, thrusting into her again and again, pulling himself almost all the way out between each stroke. He listened to the sounds she made and watched her face as her mouth would come open to gasp or cry out and then then she would bite her lip, and her eyes would squeeze tightly shut as she lost herself to sensation and then open, blue and bottomless and widened in need as she looked up at him. The sight of her laid down upon the bed before him, hair spread out like a fiery halo against the white sheet and strands of red, gold, purple, green, blue, and silver beads falling down to the bed on both sides of her neck with every thrust he made was almost more than he could stand. 

He stilled himself for a moment, deep inside her, standing upon trembling legs, feeling her ass in his hands, the backs of her thighs against his torso and her ankles digging into the backs of his shoulders as she bent her knees to pull herself even more tightly against him. Her chest rose and fell with her panting breaths, her nipples taut and tempting him to suckle them. He felt her inner muscles warm and wet around him, and his whole world came down to the two of them joined together in that moment, for all moments for the rest of his life.

The blue eyes locked onto his, and she reached both hands up to grab his hips, pulling him as far into her as he could go. “Please, Ned,” she whispered. “Now.”

He pulled himself out and thrust into her one more time, making an almost inhuman noise himself as his balls contracted and he felt himself come in a rush of hot liquid filling her up. Her entire body shook, and he felt her come again around him as his legs turned to jelly. He gently lowered her legs and allowed himself to collapse down between them to lie atop her, his cock still inside her, still feeling the tremors that continued to roll through her body.

After a few moments or a few eternities, he had gone soft, and he pulled himself out and stood once more, bending to press kisses first to both those tempting nipples and then her lips as she made sort of sleepy, satisfied sounds, smiling without opening her eyes.

“I love you, Cat.”

“I love you more,” she murmured, still not opening her eyes. Her words sounded more indistinct than they had, and he smiled.

“Unlikely,” he whispered. Then he crawled onto the bed beside her and pulled her up on it so that her head reached the pillows and her legs no longer dangled off the end. He carefully lifted her body enough to pull the sheet out from beneath her and cover her up. Then he lifted her head off the pillow enough to carefully remove strand after strand of the colored beads, careful not to tangle them in her hair. She occasionally made soft little noises, but she never opened her eyes, and he knew she wasn’t truly awake any more. With all the Hurricanes she’d drunk earlier, he wasn’t surprised.

He tossed the mountain of cheap necklaces onto the bedside table, not caring that at least half of them fell off onto the floor. Then he lay down beside her, raising up on one elbow to look at her beautiful sleeping face. Unbidden, Robert’s old, only-half joking words came back to his mind. _But look at you! How did a stick-in-the-mud with your face get that stone cold fox to LOOK at you, much less fuck or marry you, for Christ’s sake?_

“How in God’s name did you end up with me?” he asked his sleeping wife softly as he toyed with a strand of that hair that he loved so much. “What in hell did I do to deserve you?”

To his immense surprise, her lips curved up into a small smile although she otherwise appeared still asleep. Then she spoke. “You still actually wonder about that, don’t you? After all these years.” She sounded rather surprised at the fact, but her voice had an almost sing-song quality to it as if she still weren’t quite awake. 

“I suppose I’ll always wonder,” he said, now yawning himself and still more or less convinced he was speaking with a sleeping woman.

To his even greater surprise, those blue eyes popped open and looked up at him. “Why don’t you just ask me instead?” she asked seriously. She sounded fully awake now even if her words did remain ever so slightly slurred.

“Do you know?” he asked softly.

She laughed. “Of course I do,” she said. “You are the finest man I know, Eddard Stark. You deserve the best. Since you persist in believing for whatever reason that I am the best, you deserve me. And so you shall have me, and I am so very thankful to be the one you want.”

He stared at her lying there smiling at him as if she’d just said the most obvious thing in the world. And maybe to her, it was obvious. He’d just try to accept her reasoning as inexplicable as it was and thank God that she did love him as she did for he was hopelessly, irrevocably in love with her. He pressed his lips to hers, and she gently kissed him back before mumbling something completely unintelligible and rolling to her side to press her back against him. He lay down and put his arm over her, holding her close just as he hoped to do forever, and fell asleep breathing in the sweet scent of his wife’s hair.


	54. Chance Collisions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story is Arya/Gendry.
> 
> It was written as a birthday present several months back for the lovely jeeno2, and I have since been encouraged to put it on AO3.
> 
> A modern AU version of Gendy and Arya's first meeting after Arya bangs up her sister's car when she wasn't supposed to even have it or be anywhere near the place she drove it!

“Damn it!”

Arya Stark looked at the scratches in the blue paint with dismay. Sansa was going to kill her. She knelt down to inspect the rear bumper of her sister’s blue Mustang convertible and swore loudly when she realized at least one of them was down to the primer. This would be more than a quick touch-up job.

“Why the fuck is this stupid post even here?” she said to no one in particular, standing up and kicking the yellow concrete post she’d not seen until after she backed into it.

“If I had to guess, it’s to keep people from driving out of this parking lot through that field” said an amused sounding male voice.

Arya looked up to see a tall muscular guy with black hair smiling at her from in front of Sansa’s car. His black T-shirt identified him as one of the security guys for this club which made Arya scowl at him as much as his shitty remark did. If the security idiot working the front door had just let her in, she wouldn’t have been angry, and she never would have backed the car out so fast. “No one’s talking to you,” she said.

“No one else is here. Just you, me, and …” He made a sweeping motion with his arm indicating the entire border of the parking lot. “All of these posts—painted yellow for visibility.”

“You’re an asshole, you know that?” she told him.

“And you’re a real charmer. Is that how they teach you to talk in those fancy private schools?”

Arya just wanted to get the hell out of there and had been ready to hop back in her sister’s car and run over this guy if he didn’t move, but that comment stopped her. “Why are you talking to me exactly? And what do you know about where I go to school, anyway?”

He laughed. “You’re Arya Stark.”

Her eyes widened a bit, and he laughed again. “I don’t have ESP or anything. But I do read the papers. And your family’s been all over them. Lots of pictures. If you’re gonna try to sneak into clubs, you might want to wait until after all the stuff about Casterly Rock Investments and the Lannister trial has died down. Nobody will remember what the District Attorney’s _sixteen_ year old daughter looks like then.”

Arya glared at him, hating the emphasis he put on her age. Robb had been going to clubs since before he turned twenty-one. Even Miss Perfect had gone a few times, and she was only eighteen. “And they put the name of my school in those articles?” she asked him, crossing her arms in front of her. He really was very tall, and she had to tilt her head back a bit to look him in the eye, even standing across the car from him.

“No,” he laughed. “I have no idea where you go to school. But with that car and your dad being the D.A …” He shrugged. “You seem like private school material to me.”

“I’m not any kind of _material_ ,” she said. “Who are you anyway? And why are you out here talking to me? Don’t you have a job to do?”

“Gendry Waters,” he said, still grinning at her which irritated her to no end as he walked around the car sticking his hand out for her to shake. “And I’m doing my job. Look, you were shut down at the door because the manager recognized you. Mark said your I.D. was really good. He actually felt bad taking it away from you. I was sent out here to make sure you left the property with no problems.”

“Yeah,” Arya snorted. “Well, that didn’t happen.” She looked back down at the bumper. “I am so fucked,” she said.

“Let me take a look at it.”

She looked back up at him. He was even taller up close. He also had startling blue eyes that made her catch her breath a bit—not like Mother’s or Sansa’s—dark blue. Like really dark. She realized she was staring and coughed. “Suit yourself.”

He knelt down to run his hand along the bumper, and she noted how broad his shoulders were. The t-shirt fit him really well, and she watched the movement of those shoulders as he moved his hand over the damaged area of the car.

“That whole piece will need redone,” he said, standing back up. “Too deep not to sand it down, and it’s actually dented just a bit here …and here.”

Arya sighed. “Yeah. I thought so.”

“It won’t cost enough to turn it into your insurance, if that’s what you’re worried about. Three-four hundred dollars tops. Probably less than your deductible.”

“Whatever.”

“Like your dad doesn’t have four hundred dollars. I mean, look at your car! You don’t have to tell him you banged it up trying to get into a club on fake I.D. You can find posts like these lots of places. Tell him you backed into one at the grocery store.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Your dad’s that big a hardass? I mean he looks pretty grim in his pictures, but …”

“My dad is wonderful!” she interrupted him. Who did this jerk think he was, making assumptions about her family from stupid pictures in the paper? And why would he look at pictures of her family so closely anyway? It was creepy.

“Then tell Daddy Wonderful your pretty car got hurt, and he’ll fix it for you. What’s the problem?”

“It’s not my car! That’s the problem. And shut the fuck up about my dad already!”

“It’s not your car? Really?”

“No. It’s my sister’s, okay? And I’m not supposed to have it. Are you happy now?”

He looked at her a moment and then burst out laughing.

“Yeah,” she said, nodding. “Laugh. It’s nice to know somebody thinks this is funny.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, getting his laughter under control. “It’s just …you aren’t quite what I expected.” He sighed. “I can help you with the car, but not until tomorrow.”

“Oh, really? You do car repair? Is that part of your job, too?”

“Actually, it is,” he said. “Just not this one. I work in Tobho Mott’s body shop. I’ve been there almost two years now. That’s my full time job. I just do this on weekend nights for extra money.”

Arya wanted to trust him. She needed help if he could really offer it, but she didn’t really know him, and she didn’t like the way he knew stuff about her family. “What’s it gonna cost me?”

He shrugged those big shoulders. “I won’t charge you for the labor. Shop’s closed on Sundays, but I have a key. Mr. Mott lets me work on my car there if I want. You’ll have to pay for whatever paint and supplies I use—but the biggest part of a repair bill is labor so it shouldn’t be too much. And I don’t have to have it right away.”

“Why?”

“Why don’t I need it right away?”

“No. Why are you doing this? You don’t even know me.”

“I don’t know. You seem a nice enough kid. I did some stupid stuff when I was a teenager. Maybe I wish somebody helped me out.”

He thought of her as a kid. That bothered her more than she wanted to admit. “Can it be fixed before five o’clock tomorrow?” she asked.

“Sure. If you can get it to me in the morning. Your sister won’t be driving it?”

Arya bit her lip, wondering if she were the biggest idiot in the world for trusting this guy, but ready to clutch at any straw that might get her out of the mess she was in. “My sister’s out of town overnight. With my parents. She had some ballet thing, and Bran and Rickon and I didn’t want to go. The boys got shipped off to my Uncle Edmure’s but I convinced Mom and Dad to let me stay in the house by myself. They …um…left me Mom’s minivan in case I needed to drive someplace in like an emergency, but otherwise I’m not supposed to be out. I kinda told them I had a bunch of schoolwork to do.”

Gendry started laughing again before she even finished talking. “Well, I wouldn’t have sneaked out to a club in a minivan either,” he said when he finally stopped. “Not with this sweet ride sitting there in the garage.”

Arya eyed the blue convertible. It wasn’t really her style, but it did beat the hell out of a minivan. Sansa had gotten it for her eighteenth birthday. Mom and Dad had tried to talk her out of it, saying a convertible wasn’t really very practical, but Sansa had wanted it. And what Sansa wants …”

“Hey! What did I say wrong now?” Gendry was looking at her with a puzzled expression, and she realized thinking of Sansa had made her scowl.

“Nothing. How do I get to this body shop and what time should I be there?”

Gendry smiled at her and pulled a little notepad out of his hip pocket. She wondered what security guards took notes about. Maybe they wrote down names and descriptions of of guys who tended to start fights or leave without paying their tab. Or teenaged girls who tried to get in with fake I.D.s.

“Here,” he said, ripping off a sheet and handing it to her. “Here’s the address. This thing has GPS, right?”

“Of course. So does my phone. I’ll be there tomorrow.”

“I’ll be there at nine a.m. Drive carefully.”

“Ha ha.”

“No, Arya. I mean it. It’s really dark now and the crazies are out on Saturday nights. And the drunks. Be careful.”

He looked at her with those fabulous blue eyes, and she couldn’t help but think he did mean it.

“I will. See you in the morning.”

She drove home thinking about black hair, blue, eyes, and muscled shoulders. She wondered why none of the boys at her school looked anything like that and prayed that she wasn’t a complete idiot for telling a guy who looked at pictures of her in a newspaper that she was alone in her house all night.

______________________________________________________  
Gendry didn’t get home from the club until after three, and he cursed himself for his idiotic impulsive offer to the Stark girl at least a hundred times when his alarm went off entirely too early. When he reached the shop at 9:05 and there was no blue convertible in the lot, he swore out loud.

 _If that kid doesn’t show after I’ve dragged my ass out of bed on my one day to sleep in …_ What the hell did he care about Arya Stark anyway? So what if her parents found out she wrecked her sister’s car? What were they going to do? Take her silver spoon away for a month? That girl had probably never even seen real trouble. There was something about her though …something that made him want to protect her. He thought she’d be really pissed off if she knew that, and it made him like her even more.

He walked over to the Speedway across the street to buy a Monster. This day would definitely require caffeine. As he paid for it, he spied the faces of Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon looking up at him from the front page of the paper.

_Jesus! Would this damn story never go away?_

Cursing himself for it, he tossed a paper on the counter with his energy drink. Back at the shop, he sat in his car and read the article which had little new information—just more crap about how Fat Robert’s bringing information to his good friend the D.A. about irregularities at Baratheon had led to the huge investigation which brought down the Lannisters.

“Yeah,” Gendry said darkly. “He’s a real hero. I still say the fat bastard did it just to spite his ex-wife.”

“What fat bastard wants to spite his ex-wife?”

Gendry jumped in his seat, nearly spilling what was left in the Monster can. “You shouldn’t sneak up on people, young lady,” he said to a grinning Arya who was walking toward his open window. Quickly, he laid the paper face down in the floor of the passenger seat.

“I’m not a young lady,” she said. “Only my parents call me that.”

“So what does everyone else call you?” he said, getting out of his car and walking over to unlock the shop.

“Oh, depends on who’s talking,” she said breezily. “Sansa calls me ‘brat’ a lot. Her idiot friend calls me ‘Horseface.’ Mr. Pycelle at school called me juvenile delinquent once.”

Gendry laughed. He couldn’t help it. Something about this girl just made him want to smile and laugh. “Well,” he said. “I’d wager you can be a brat. Considering you stole and banged up your sister’s car, you definitely have potential as a juvenile delinquent. But you don’t look anything like a horse.”

She smiled at him—a surprised, pleased sort of smile that lit up her face. She was really quite pretty when she smiled, he realized. “Get in your car. Your sister’s car,” he corrected himself before she could correct him. I’ll go in and raise the garage door and guide you in. Okay?”

“Okay,” she said. “Let’s do this.”

The morning passed far more quickly than Gendry would have thought. Arya Stark was pretty good company as he worked. For all she was a kid and a smartass, she was also intelligent. She asked questions about what he was doing—good questions. And she seemed honestly interested in the answers. She told him a little about herself and her family. She thought her parents were much too strict although they sounded pretty reasonable to Gendry; and strict or not, Arya obviously adored them. She seemed fond of all her brothers, and she professed to hate her sister. Gendry thought she was probably just jealous. He’d seen the older Stark girl in the papers, too, and even on television when she’d been dating that little fucker Joffrey Baratheon. She was a knockout—the kind of girl any little sister might envy.

Personally, he thought he’d prefer Arya to her glamour girl sister any day, but he didn’t say anything of the sort. He was well aware that she was watching him a little too closely as he worked. He liked her watching him, if he were being honest with himself. But still, she was jailbait. Sixteen. And from a prominent, respected family. The DO NOT TOUCH signs were all over her, and he wasn’t about to forget that.

At around two o’clock, they walked over to the Speedway and got sandwiches and candy bars to eat while they were letting the final coat dry. Arya asked him questions about himself, and feeling that he couldn’t just say nothing after she’d told him about her family, he gave her the basics.

He told her his mom died when he was eight, and that he’d bounced around in the foster care system until he ran away at fourteen. He honestly told her he probably would have ended up dead or in jail if he hadn’t run into a man who ran sort of a support group for street kids. She’d listened to him with wide eyes as he described a life she couldn’t possibly know anything about.

“Yeah,” he said. “Beric helped us get jobs and job training. He helped a bunch of us get our GEDs, too. And he’d find us a place to crash when we needed. He didn’t have a real facility or anything. Kind of operated outside the system. A lot of people criticized him for that—saying that what we all needed was stable homes. Yeah. I’d already tried their version of stable homes. Foster care sucked. Beric may not have followed the letter of the law when it came to us, but he made us brothers. Gave us purpose. And he got me the job with Mr. Mott two years ago.”

“Sounds like a great guy.”

“He is.”

“So you have a real home now?” Arya asked him.

“I’ve got an apartment nearby.” He didn’t want her to ask him where it was. He didn’t need this girl showing up to visit. Talking with her had been the easiest conversation he’d had in a long time. He was actually grateful every time she did something to remind him how young she was. When they went to inspect the finished bumper, she jumped up and down, and he smiled.

“Gendry, this is amazing!” she gushed. “Sansa will never even know I took it!”

Then she surprised him by jumping up and throwing her arms around his neck. Stunned, he put his arms around her and hugged her quickly before letting go and pushing her away. “I’m glad you like it,” he said.

“Like it?” she said, turning back to the car. “I love it! Not even Robb will be able to tell …Oh my goodness, Robb!”

“What? What about Robb?” Gendry asked her, worried that something was amiss.

“My brother Robb got this old muscle car—from the 1970s or something—and it needs a bunch of stuff done. He’s coming home next weekend. I can tell him how great you are and that he needs to bring it here to you!”

She looked so excited that Gendry had to grin at her. “And just how are you going to explain your knowledge of my skills?”

She waved her hand. “Oh, I’ll say you did some work for one of my friends. No big deal. Robb knows I know all sorts of people. But, Gendry, Robb hangs out with all kinds of guys who love cars. I mean REALLY love cars. And they’re rich. I bet you could make a ton of money off them.”

“Well, I’m not out to fleece anybody, Arya.”

“I know that, stupid. I mean, they want all kinds of things done to their cars. And they can pay for it!”

Gendry had planned to fix the girl’s car and get her out of his life. He really had. But a whole group of potential clients was hard to turn down. “Your brother, Robb …he isn’t friends with Joffrey Baratheon, is he?”

Arya looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “That shit? Are you kidding? After the way he treated Sansa, Robb would kill him if he just looks at any of us. So would I.”

She didn’t elaborate, but her grey eyes had gone cold and stormy, and Gendry realized the breakup between Joffrey Baratheon and Sansa Stark must have been even uglier than what had been hinted in the celebrity gossip. That expression also confirmed to him he’d been right about Arya not actually hating her sister. She looked fully prepared to murder the ex-boyfriend.

Still, the Starks and Baratheons were pictured together all the time. He didn’t want anywhere near the Baratheons, not until he was sure he was right. And maybe not even then. _I hate that fat bastard._

“But I thought your dad and Robert Baratheon were big buddies. The papers …”

“What is your fucking obsession with my family in the papers, Gendry?” she suddenly exploded.

“That’s not very nice language for a debutante, young lady,” Gendry said, trying to deflect her.

“I am not a fucking debutante, and I already told you I am no young lady. Answer my question. Why are you stalking my family?”

“I am not stalking your family, Arya.”

“Bullshit. I saw you in your car when I got here. You were looking at the picture of my dad. Why?”

He looked at her, staring up at him. She was so tiny, but she stood there as if she could make him answer her by sheer force of will. She really was something, and he couldn’t lie to her. He couldn’t let her think he was some creep stalking her family, either.

“I have been following the trial, Arya,” he said finally. “But it’s not about your family. Honest. I have no interest in your family except in their connection to the Baratheons.”

“Dad is NOT protecting Robert from prosecution. That’s bullshit, Gendry, and Tywin Lannister had no evidence. He was just …”

“Woah. That’s not what I meant. I believe you. I know your dad tried to have himself removed from this case because of his friendship with Robert Baratheon and that the judge refused to replace him. Your father bent over backward to have all the evidence out in the open here. And as I recall, he pushed to have Robert charged with a couple misdemeanors over the whole big mess. Those weren’t pursued for lack of evidence.”

Arya made a sound of disgust. “Lack of evidence. Robert probably paid somebody.”

Gendry opened his eyes wide.

“Oh, don’t look so shocked,” she said. “Robert’s not …he’s not a Lannister. But he’s not above bending the rules when it suits him. And yes, he and Dad have been friends forever, but Dad’s never been a fan of Robert’s business practices and once he became District Attorney, he told Robert that if he broke the law, he’d be prosecuted just like anyone else. But someone took that part of it out of Dad’s hands.”

“Really?”

“Look. I shouldn’t talk about any of this. I’ll just say that Dad and Robert aren’t as close as they used to be, okay? And as for Joffrey, Dad would probably kill him quicker than Robb or me.”

“Wow. Okay, then. I could use the extra money, Arya. That’s why I took the security job. If your brother and his friends need custom work, I’d be glad to take them on.”

“Okay. But that still doesn’t explain why you care about my dad and Robert Baratheon.”

He paused for a long time. “You aren’t the only one who has things they can’t talk about. I swear to you it has nothing to do with your dad or anybody else in your family. But there are things I need to learn about Robert Baratheon. I have my reasons. But I really can’t talk about them.”

She bit her lower lip and chewed on it a moment. “Is it for something illegal? Do you want to hurt Robert? “

_Do I want to hurt Robert Baratheon? God what a question! I don’t even know what I want from the fat bastard!_

“Nothing illegal, I promise. And I have no intention of hurting anybody.”

“Good. Because I don’t think Dad would want Robert really hurt, no matter how mad he is at him.”

Gendry laughed at her serious expression. “Jesus, Arya! What do you think I am? A hit man?”

She grinned at him. “No. You’re too young to be a hit man.”

“I didn’t know there was an age requirement,” he said. “I am twenty-one, by the way.” It somehow seemed important that she knew that.

“Well, duh. You work security for a nightclub. You have to be twenty-one—at least.”

They stood there looking at each other, suddenly awkward.

“Hey,” Gendry finally said. “It’s getting kind of late. Don’t you have to have that car back by five?”

“Oh my god, yes! I can’t believe I forgot about that. Um, I guess you can’t send me a bill or anything. Just …figure out how much I owe you, and call me. Get your phone and I’ll give you my number.”

He did as she asked, and she was getting into the blue convertible before he knew it. “Bye, Gendry,” she called as she backed out. She was looking at him rather than behind her, and he began to understand how she’d dinged the bumper in the first place. “Thanks for everything! You are the best! Call me!”

“Look where you’re going!”

She made a face at him, but she did turn around. As he watched her drive off, he found himself wanting to call her. _She’s a kid._ He hoped her brother called about his car. He could use the money. He’d like a chance to see Arya again as well. _She’s sixteen._

Sighing, he locked up the shop and walked to his own car. On the drive home, he thought about the prospect of more business. He thought about the things Arya had told him about Robert Baratheon. Mostly, he wondered what Arya Stark would be like at eighteen.


End file.
